. 

LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 

Class 


THE  REMINISCENCES 

OF 

JAMES   BURRILL   ANGELL 


^/rz' 


*  ) 


THE 

REMINISCENCES 

OF 

JAMES  BUERILL  ANGELL 


LONGMANS,    GREEN,    AND    CO 

FOURTH  AVENUE  &  30TH  STREET,  NEW  YORK 

LONDON,    BOMBAY,    AND   CALCUTTA 

1912 


COPYRIGHT,    1911,    BY 
LONGMANS,   GREEN,  AND    CO. 


THE  •   PLIMPTON  •  PBESS 
[  W  D'O] 

NORWOOD  •  MASS  •  U  •  S  •  A 


PREFACE 

MANY  of  my  friends  can  bear  witness 
that  it  is  not  without  a  certain  reluctance 
that  I  have  prepared  this  volume  of  Rem 
iniscences  for  publication.  I  have  done  it 
under  the  pressure  of  frequent  and  urgent 
requests  from  colleagues  in  the  Faculties, 
and  from  students  of  the  three  Universities, 
with  which  I  have  been  officially  connected. 
They  have  thought  that  many  of  the  facts 
which  I  have  described  in  my  narrative  are 
worthy  of  being  recorded  in  a  permanent 
form. 

I  venture  to  hope  that  the  narrative  may 
prove  of  interest  to  them.  I  can  assure 
them,  however,  that  autobiography  compels 
one  to  write  so  largely  of  one's  self  that  it 
involves  the  serious  discomfort  of  a  seeming 
lack  of  modesty.  But  that  discomfort  will 
be  cheerfully  borne  by  the  writer,  if  this 
volume  shall  help  to  keep  him  in  touch 
with  the  colleagues  and  students  whose 
friendship  has  brought  so  much  joy  into 
his  life. 


UNIVERSITY  OP  MICHIGAN, 
July  1,  1911. 


[v] 
235599 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

FROM  BIRTH  TO  GRADUATION.     1829-1849     .      .  1 

THE  SOUTHERN  JOURNEY 41 

CIVIL  ENGINEERING  AND  STUDY  IN  EUROPE  .      .  77 

PROFESSORSHIP  IN  BROWN  UNIVERSITY     .      .      .  105 

PRESIDENCY  OF  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  VERMONT     .  121 

THE  MISSION  TO  CHINA 128 

THE  CANADIAN  FISHERIES  COMMISSION      .      .      .  169 

SUMMER  TRIPS  TO  EUROPE 180 

MISSION  TO  OTTOMAN  EMPIRE 188 

PRESIDENCY  OF  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  MICHIGAN  225 


vn 


EEMINISCENCES    OF 
JAMES  B.  ANGELL 

I 

FROM  BIRTH  TO  GRADUATION 

1829-1849 

I  WAS  born  in  Scituate,  Rhode  Island, 
on  January  7,  1829.  My  parents  were 
Andrew  Aldrich  Angell  and  Amy  Aldrich 
Angell.  They  were  remotely  related.  I 
am  the  oldest  of  eight  children,  two  of 
whom  died  in  infancy.  I  am  the  lineal 
descendant,  of  the  seventh  generation,  from 
Thomas  Angell  who,  an  Englishman  by 
birth,  came,  in  1631,  to  Massachusetts 
with  Roger  Williams,  and,  in  1636,  accom 
panied  Williams  when  the  latter  settled  on 
the  spot  to  which  he  gave  the  name  of  Provi 
dence.  Thomas  Angell  was  one  of  the 
signers  of  the  noted  compact1  to  which 

lThis  is  the  Compact.  "We  whose  names  are  here- 
under  written,  being  desirous  to  inhabit  in  the  town  of 
Providence,  do  promise  to  submit  ourselves  in  active  or 
passive  obedience,  to  all  such  orders  or  agreements  as 
shall  be  made  for  public  good  of  the  body,  in  an  orderly 
way,  by  the  major  consent  of  the  present  inhabitants, 
masters  of  families  incorporated  together  into  a  township, 
and  such  others  whom  they  shall  admit  into  the  same, 
only  in  civil  things."  Signed  by  thirteen  persons. 

[i] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Rhode  Islanders  have  always  looked  back 
with  pride,  as  the  first  instrument  of  pure 
democracy,  which  leaves  absolute  freedom 
in  matters  of  religious  concern. 

In  1675,  as  is  learned  from  the  Provi 
dence  Early  Records,  lands  on  the  west 
side  of  the  so-called  Seven  Mile  Line  were 
assigned  to  several  men.  Among  them  was 
Thomas  Angell.  His  grandson  and  name 
sake,  Thomas,  appears  to  have  settled  in 
1710  on  the  farm  on  which  I  was  born. 

The  town  was  incorporated  in  1731. 
Why  the  name  Scituate  was  given  to  it  is 
not  clear.  It  has  been  thought  by  some  it 
was  because  it  was  partly  settled  by  emi 
grants  from  Scituate,  Massachusetts.  But 
I  have  never  heard  of  but  one  settler  from 
that  place.  We  know  that  the  Massachu 
setts  antiquarians  believe  that  the  name  is 
Indian,  being  written  Setuat,  or  nearly  in 
that  form,  and  signifying  Cold  Brooks.1 
It  is  not  improbable  that  the  site  of  the 
town  in  Rhode  Island  bore  a  similar  Indian 
name,  and  was  anglicized  like  that  in 
Massachusetts  by  the  form  Scituate. 

The  land,  or  a  portion  of  it,  on  which 
Thomas  settled,  was  held  and  occupied 
continuously  by  his  descendants  until  after 
the  death  of  my  father  in  1864.  Repre- 

1 "  Mass.  Hist.  Coll.,"  Second  Series,  Vol.  4,  p.  223. 

[2] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

sentatives  of  the  Angell  family  are  numerous 
in  Rhode  Island,  where  in  the  main  they 
have  remained.  They  have  been  found 
chiefly  in  the  ranks  of  plain  farmers,  me 
chanics  and  tradesmen,  gaining  by  industry 
and  integrity  an  honest  living,  but  win 
ning  no  particular  distinction.  Those  best 
known,  perhaps,  are  Col.  Israel  Angell,  who 
commanded  in  a  creditable  manner  a  regi 
ment  in  the  Revolution,  and  Joseph  Kinni- 
cutt  Angell,  whose  books  on  law  gave  him 
some  eminence  in  the  last  generation. 
Nearly  always  some  of  them  have  been 
found  in  the  State  Legislature. 

My  immediate  ancestors,  like  many  of  the 
farmers  of  former  days  who  lived  on  some 
important  thoroughfare,  combined  the  busi 
ness  of  tavern -keeping  with  that  of  farming. 
At  an  early  day  the  Providence  and  Nor 
wich  Turnpike  Company,  whose  road  passed 
through  our  farm,  was  chartered.  The 
farmers  of  several  towns  in  eastern  Con 
necticut  then  marketed  their  products  in 
Providence  and  so  travelled  the  turnpike 
road.  During  the  War  of  1812,  much  of 
the  travel  and  transportation  by  land  be 
tween  Boston  and  New  York  went  by  this 
route.  Good  inns  were  therefore  needed. 
Through  the  period  of  my  boyhood  the 
number  of  travellers  who  sought  accom- 
[3] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

modations  in  the  spacious  house  which  my 
grandfather  erected  in  1810,  was  very  con 
siderable.  In  earlier  days,  the  town  meet 
ings  were  held  at  the  tavern.  In  my  own 
time,  the  military  gatherings — the  "  General 
Trainings  "  -  were  held  in  the  intervales 
near  by;  political  meetings,  occasionally  a 
justice's  court,  were  held  in  a  large  hall 
which  formed  a  part  of  the  house.  Com 
pared  with  the  seclusion  of  the  ordinary 
farmer's  boy's  life,  it  will  readily  be  seen 
that  life  here  was  very  stirring.  I  have 
always  felt  that  the  knowledge  of  men  I 
gained  by  the  observations  and  experiences 
of  my  boyhood  in  the  country  tavern  has 
been  of  the  greatest  service.  Human  nature 
could  be  studied  in  every  variety,  from  that 
of  the  common  farm  labourer  to  travellers 
of  the  highest  breeding  and  refinement.  The 
eminent  political  speakers  were  always  en 
tertained  at  our  table,  and  some  of  them 
were  very  helpful  friends  in  my  later  life. 
If,  as  I  have  sometimes  been  assured,  I  have 
any  power  of  adaptation  to  the  society  of 
different  classes  of  men,  I  owe  it  in  no 
small  degree  to  these  varied  associations  of 
my  boyhood. 

I  began  my  education  by  learning  my 
alphabet  from  an  old  law  book.     My  grand 
father  had  been  Justice  of  the  Peace,  and 
[4] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

therefore  had  this  volume,  each  chapter  of 
which  began  with  a  very  large  capital  letter. 
Under  the  guidance  of  my  uncle,  I  learned 
these  letters.  That  fact  is  my  earliest 
recollection.  I  recall  with  especial  dis 
tinctness  the  large  J,  as  I  was  made  to 
understand  that  it  was  the  initial  of  my 
name. 

I  may  remark  in  passing  that  my  name 
was  given  me  by  my  step-grandfather,  who 
was  an  admirer  of  James  Burrill,1  an  early 
United  States  Senator  from  Rhode  Island. 

At  a  very  early  age  (I  know  not  how 
early),  I  was  sent  to  the  District  School.  I 
remember  that  I  was  so  young  that  my 
father  used  frequently  to  take  me  to  school 
on  horseback  in  front  of  him  on  the  saddle. 
A  large  boy  of  the  neighbourhood  wTas  hired 
to  take  charge  of  me  on  the  road  when  I 
walked.  The  district  school  was  then  in  a 
very  primitive  state.  A  sloping  board  at 
tached  to  the  wall  quite  around  the  room 
was  the  writing  desk  for  all  the  larger 
pupils.  They  sat  on  benches  with  their 
backs  towards  the  middle  of  the  room. 
The  small  scholars  sat  on  low  benches  in 
the  centre  of  the  room.  Those  who  wrote 

1  He  was  the  grandfather  of  George  William  Curtis 
and  Rev.  James  Burrill  Curtis.  Hence  George  Curtis 
used  playfully  to  call  me  his  cousin. 

[5] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

made  their  own  writing  books.  They  pur 
chased  unruled  paper,  cut  it  into  leaves, 
stitched  them  together,  put  a  rough  brown 
paper  cover  on,  and  ruled  the  lines  with  a 
leaden  plummet.  The  first  duty  in  the 
morning  was  to  mend  the  goose-quill  pens, 
and  in  the  winter  to  thaw  the  ink  on  the 
stove.  The  highest  branch  was  Daboll's 
Arithmetic,  and  the  older  pupils  who  had 
completed  it  one  winter  came  back  the 
next  and  "ciphered  through  it"  again. 
Reading,  spelling,  writing,  a  little  grammar, 
elementary  geography,  and  arithmetic,  fur 
nished  the  whole  curriculum. 

Fortunately  for  me,  when  I  was  about 
eight  years  of  age  a  Quaker,  Isaac  Fiske, 
came  to  the  neighbourhood,  and  established 
a  school  for  boarders  and  for  day  scholars, 
and  I  was  placed  under  his  care.  He  was  a 
most  thorough,  painstaking,  and  exacting 
teacher.  He  had  little  class-work.  His 
instruction  was  personal.  He  went  round 
from  pupil  to  pupil  to  render  needed  assist 
ance  in  solving  mathematical  problems. 
When  we  had  completed  them  he  required 
us  to  copy  our  work  neatly  into  manuscript 
books.  I  remained  with  him  four  years, 
and  not  only  completed  arithmetic,  but 
studied  surveying  also.  As  he  did  not 
teach  foreign  languages,  ancient  or  modern, 
[6] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

he  advised  my  parents  to  place  me  in  some 
school  where  I  might  study  Latin.  But, 
for  the  thoroughness  of  his  instruction  I 
have  always  felt  under  deep  obligations  to 
him. 

Some  boys  whom  I  knew  were  attending  a 
seminary  in  Seekonk,  Massachusetts,  about 
three  miles  from  Providence,  and  urged  me 
to  come  there.  It  was  a  great  trial  to  my 
mother  to  have  me  leave  home ;  but  it  was 
decided  that  I  ought  to  go.  I  was  then 
twelve  years  old.  On  arriving  at  the  school, 
I  found  that  in  arithmetic  I  was  far  ahead 
of  the  boys  of  my  age,  and  so  it  was 
wisely  concluded  that  I  should  give  my 
whole  time  to  Latin.  And  this  experiment 
of  intensive  study,  carried  on  in  a  rational 
way,  had  a  very  interesting  result.  The 
principal  put  me  in  charge  of  his  sister,  a 
very  intelligent  woman.  He  had  been  drill 
ing  a  class  of  older  boys  two  years  on  the 
dry  rules  of  Latin  grammar,  without  letting 
them  read  much  Latin.  The  sister  gave  me 
a  small  book  containing  the  paradigms  and 
easy  reading  lessons.  I  met  her  twice  a 
day,  finished  the  book,  and  by  the  end  of 
the  three  months'  term  was  able  to  join 
the  class  of  older  boys  in  such  reading  as 
was  then  set  for  them,  and  to  go  on  with 
them  without  difficulty. 

[7] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

After .  I  had  spent  one  term  at  this 
school,  my  parents  decided  to  send  me 
to  the  Smithville  Seminary,  an  Academy 
which  the  Freewill  Baptists  had  estab 
lished  in  the  northern  part  of  my  own 
town,  only  five  miles  from  my  home. 

The  two  principal  instructors,  Rev.  Hosea 
Quinby,  a  graduate  of  Waterville  College, 
Maine,  and  Mr.  S.  L.  Weld,  a  graduate  of 
Brown  University,  were  familiar  with  the 
traditional  methods  of  the  New  England 
Academy.  Without  being  eminent  scholars, 
they  had  the  faculty  of  interesting,  and  to  a 
fair  degree  of  stimulating,  their  pupils. 
Most  of  these  were  farmers'  sons  and 
daughters  who  wished  to  supplement  the 
limited  work  of  the  district  schools.  A 
small  number  were  preparing  themselves 
for  college.  I  joined  them  in  their  classes 
with  no  such  purpose  distinctly  formed.  I 
also  took  nearly  all  the  scientific  instruc 
tion  which  was  given,  and  given  as  well  as 
it  could  be  without  laboratories  or  much 
apparatus.  Many  of  the  students  were 
men  in  years.  They  were  diligent  students. 
Some  of  them  were  awkward  and  rustic  in 
manners,  but  they  were  thoroughly  earnest 
and  gave  a  good  tone  to  the  school. 

The  best  instruction,  and  that  was  the 
case  in  such  schools  generally,  was  in  mathe- 
[8] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

matics.  I  pushed  on  through  algebra  and 
plane  and  solid  geometry.  English  was 
taught  by  the  stupid  method  of  parsing 
"Pope's  Essay  on  Man"  and  that  dolorous 
book,  "Pollock's  Course  of  Time."  The 
ideals  of  writing  and  speaking  which  were 
in  vogue  were  greatly  wanting  in  simplicity 
and  directness.  The  instruction  in  the 
classics,  while  it  would  not  now  be  regarded 
as  sufficiently  critical,  encouraged  and  en 
abled  us  to  read  rapidly  enough  to  get  real 
enjoyment  from  the  author.  We  soon 
caught  the  swing  and  the  flow  of  the  Vir- 
gilian  verse,  so  that  we  read  with  genuine 
delight  in  the  last  six  books  of  the  ^Eneid 
at  the  rate  of  three  hundred  lines  a  day. 
The  poem  was  not  made  a  mere  frame-work 
on  which  to  hang  puzzling  questions  in 
grammar,  but  read  as  a  poem  which  we  were 
to  enjoy  as  we  did  Scott's  "Marmion"  or 
the  "  Lady  of  the  Lake. "  That  method  may 
be  deemed  old-fashioned  by  modern  doctors 
of  philosophy ;  but  I  have  always  been  very 
grateful  that  under  that  method  my  first 
acquaintance  with  Virgil  was  not  dull  task 
work,  but  the  source  of  constant  delight. 

As  I  look  back  on  the  work  done  in  the 
dead  or  moribund  academies  of  New  Eng 
land  which  have  been  supplanted  by  the 
well-appointed  high  school,  I  am  convinced 
[9] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

that,  with  their  many  defects,  due  in  large 
part  to  inadequate  means,  they  rendered 
a  most  valuable  service.  They  prepared 
teachers  for  the  district  schools,  young  men 
for  business,  and  a  limited  number  to  meet 
the  moderate  requirements  which  were 
asked  in  that  time  for  admission  to  college. 
We  are  in  danger  of  underrating  the  value 
of  their  work. 

While  during  my  fourteenth  year  I  was 
at  school  at  the  Academy,  Mr.  O.  S.  Fowler, 
a  somewhat  noted  phrenologist  of  that  day, 
gave  some  lectures  in  the  village  of  North 
Scituate  and  made  a  professional  "exami 
nation"  of  my  head.  I  still  have  his  writ 
ten  report  on  me.  It  was  ridiculous  in  its 
exaggerated  estimate  of  my  gifts,  but  it 
had  one  good  result.  He  persuaded  my 
relatives  and  friends  that  by  study  I  was 
overtaxing  my  strength,  and  that  I  ought 
to  leave  school  for  a  time  and  lead  a  vigor 
ous  out-of-door  life.  While  I  was  by  no 
means  ill,  I  have  little  doubt  that  I  owe  in 
some  degree  the  physical  vigour  with  which 
I  have  been  blessed  all  my  life  to  the  fact 
that  owing  to  his  counsel  I  spent  the  next 
two  seasons,  from  early  spring  till  late 
autumn,  at  work  upon  my  father's  farm, 
side  by  side  with  his  hired  men,  hoeing  my 
row  and  mowing  my  swath  and  learning 
[10] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

all  the  details  of  farm  work.  Much  of  this 
I  had  previously  learned  in  vacations;  but 
I  now  learned  thoroughly  how  much  back 
ache  a  dollar  earned  in  the  fields  repre 
sented.  I  was  also  enabled  to  see  how  the 
world  looks  from  the  point  of  view  of  the 
labouring  man.  Often  in  later  years,  when 
weary  with  study,  I  was  inspired  with  new 
zeal  by  recalling  how  much  severer  were 
the  fatigue  and  monotony  of  the  work  of 
the  farmer's  boy.  It  is  a  good  fortune  for 
a  boy  to  have  known  by  experience  what 
hard  and  continuous  manual  labour  means. 
The  life  in  my  native  town  during  the 
years  of  my  boyhood  was  much  like  that  in 
the  other  rural  towns  of  Rhode  Island.  It 
was  very  simple  and  frugal.  The  popula 
tion  was  of  pure  English  descent.  I  think 
my  father  within  the  period  of  my  recollec 
tion  brought  the  first  Irish  maid-servant 
into  the  town.  Farming  was  the  chief 
occupation.  There  were  half-a-dozen  cot 
ton  factories  of  moderate  size  scattered 
through  the  town;  but  the  operatives  were 
drawn  from  the  farms  and  were  all  Ameri 
cans.  The  farmers  got  their  limited  supply 
of  money  from  the  sale  chiefly  of  wood,  char 
coal,  and  potatoes,  in  Providence,  and  of 
milk  and  butter  to  the  operatives  in  the 
mills.  Some  added  to  their  income  by 

[in 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

turning  bobbins  and  spools  in  the  winter 
in  small  shops  erected  on  little  streams  upon 
their  farms.  They  found  a  ready  market 
for  their  products  in  the  cotton  factories 
through  the  State.  The  practice  of  the 
greatest  economy  was  necessary  to  make  a 
small  farm  support  a  family.  In  1840  the 
census-taker  permitted  me  to  accompany 
him  in  his  gig  over  a  large  part  of  the  town. 
I  think  we  entered  only  two  or  three  houses 
which  had  any  other  carpets  or  rugs  than 
those  which  the  occupants  had  made  from 
rags.  I  believe  that  there  were  not  more 
than  two  pianos  in  the  town.  There  was 
no  public  library;  there  were  very  few 
books  in  private  libraries.  Although  the 
town  was  only  twelve  miles  from  Brown 
University,  I  was  the  first  boy  from  Scitu- 
ate  to  graduate  from  the  college.  But 
there  had  always  been  in  the  town  some  men 
of  prominence  in  public  affairs.  Stephen 
Hopkins,  the  signer  of  the  Declaration  of 
Independence,  lived  there.  In  my  own 
time,  one  governor  of  the  State  and  one 
lieutenant-governor  resided  there ;  but 
the  great  mass  of  the  inhabitants  were 
hard-working  farmers,  who  led  toilsome, 
honest  lives,  and  left  little  to  their  children 
beyond  the  inheritance  they  had  received 
from  their  parents.  If  the  children  w^ere 
[12] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

now  willing  to  practise  the  same  industry 
and  frugality  they  could  live  with  equal 
comfort  upon  the  farms.  But  they  are 
rapidly  selling  them  to  the  Irish  and  the 
French,  who  are  willing  to  practise  even 
greater  economy  than  the  fathers  did  two 
generations  back,  and  so  are  living  in  com 
parative  thrift.  The  change  in  the  type  of 
population  is  marked,  as  it  is  in  most  of 
the  rural  towns  of  New  England,  perhaps 
even  more  so,  since  the  operatives  in  the 
factories  are  now  almost  all  of  foreign 
birth. 

The  amusements  of  the  country  folk  were 
few  and  simple.  Perhaps  the  most  gen 
erally  attractive  was  the  annual  visit  to 
the  shore  of  Narragansett  Bay,  usually  at 
a  place  called  the  Buttonwoods,  where, 
under  the  shade  of  some  sycamore  trees, 
they  made  a  clambake  after  the  manner 
of  the  Indians.  They  first  gathered  the 
clams  from  the  sand  laid  bare  by  the  reced 
ing  tide  or  the  quahog  from  the  adjacent 
waters.  They  built  a  fire  on  stones  and 
heated  them  thoroughly;  and  then  placing 
the  shell-fish  and  potatoes  and  ears  of  corn 
on  the  stones  they  covered  the  whole  with 
sea-weed,  and  the  cooking  was  slowly  done. 
While  the  roasting  was  going  on,  a  bath  in 
the  sea  was  enjoyed  by  all  who  wished  it. 
[13] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

The  clam  or  quahog,  held  in  the  hand,  was 
dipped  in  a  cup  of  melted  butter  and  eaten 
with  a  relish  which  no  participant  in  one  of 
those  out-of-door  feasts  will  ever  forget. 

Every  farmer  was  expected  to  take  his 
family  and  his  hired  men  "to  the  shore" 
at  least  once,  when  the  haying  season  was 
over.  At  the  time  of  the  August  full  moon 
the  roads  were  well  filled  with  these  pilgrims 
to  the  sea.  Occasionally  a  party  of  neigh 
bours,  numbering  fifteen  or  twenty,  hired  a 
large  sail  boat  at  Apponaug  or  East  Green 
wich,  and  after  the  clambake  sailed  down  the 
bay  to  Hope  Island,  spent  the  night  there, 
and  rose  at  dawn  to  fish.  Occasionally  the 
dullness  of  the  winter  was  enlivened  by  a 
ball  at  some  one  of  the  taverns  in  the  town ; 
but  the  life  was  upon  the  whole  monoto 
nous,  and  constant  toil  was  relieved  by  few 
amusements. 

Probably,  owing  to  the  reaction  among 
the  early  settlers  of  Rhode  Island  from  the 
Puritanical  spirit  of  their  neighbours  in 
Massachusetts  and  Connecticut,  Sunday 
was  not  generally  kept  as  it  was  in  those 
States.  It  was  the  day  for  visiting  rela 
tives  and  friends  and  largely  for  fishing  and 
hunting  and  ball-playing.  It  may  truth 
fully  be  said  that  the  factory  operatives  had 
no  other  time  for  visiting  or  for  pleasure. 
[14] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

The  most  numerous  religious  bodies  in  our 
part  of  the  State  were  the  Six  Principle 
Baptists  and  the  Freewill  Baptists.  The 
preachers  of  the  former  denomination  were 
all  men  of  limited  education;  so  were  most 
of  the  preachers  of  the  latter.  Naturally 
enough,  the  men  of  the  most  intelligence 
and  influence  rarely  attended  church,  and 
the  spiritual  life  of  the  town  was  at  a 
rather  low  ebb.  But  the  general  standard 
of  morals  would  compare  well  with  that  of 
the  present  day.  Drunkenness  and  gam 
bling  were  not  prevalent.  A  man  sup 
posed  to  be  addicted  to  gambling  or  to 
licentiousness  could  not  retain  the  public 
esteem.  Political  life  was  purer  than  it  has 
been  of  late  years  in  the  State. 

The  language  of  the  people  retained  some 
peculiar  expressions  which  must  have  come 
from  England,  and  which  I  have  heard 
rarely  or  not  at  all  in  other  parts  of  our 
country.  Thus  after  a  wedding  it  was  cus 
tomary  for  the  parents  of  the  bride  to  give 
a  party.  That  party  was  always  spoken  of 
as  the  on/are.  Whether  that  is  the  proper 
spelling  I  cannot  say,  as  I  never  saw  it  in 
print.  It  would  seem  to  come  from  the 
word  fare  in  the  sense  to  travel.  The  occa 
sion  was,  therefore,  a  sort  of  God-speed,  to 
send  the  married  couple  faring  on  their  way. 
[15] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Again,  if  a  candidate  for  office  was  going 
about,  buttonholing  men  and  soliciting 
support,  he  was  said  to  be  "parmateering." 
It  has  occurred  to  me  that  that  word  might 
be  an  abbreviation  of  Parliamenteering,  if 
that  form  was  ever  used  to  signify  going 
about  seeking  support  for  parliament.  An 
auction  was  generally  spoken  of  as  a 
vendue,  pronounced  vandue.  That  word 
borrowed  from  the  French  was  used  in 
England. 

Up  to  the  time  I  left  the  Academy  I  had 
no  fixed  plan  for  life.  My  teachers  had  en 
couraged  me  to  believe  that  I  could  succeed 
in  college  studies.  But,  although  at  the 
age  of  fourteen  I  had  covered  more  ground, 
especially  in  Latin  and  mathematics,  than 
was  required  for  admission  to  any  of  the 
New  England  colleges,  I  had  no  definite 
purpose  of  going  to  college.  During  the 
summers  I  was  at  home  on  the  farm.  I 
made  some  unsuccessful  efforts  to  secure  a 
clerkship  in  business  establishments  in 
Providence;  but  in  my  fifteenth  year  it 
was  clear  that  I  ought  to  decide  what 
career  I  should  endeavour  to  follow.  My 
father  informed  me  that  he  was  able  and 
willing  to  send  me  to  college,  but  in  that 
case  would  hardly  be  able,  in  justice  to  my 
five  brothers  and  sisters,  to  aid  me  further. 

[16] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

It  was  left  to  me  to  say  whether  I  should 
go.  I  was  certain  that  it  would  gratify 
both  him  and  my  mother  if  I  chose  to  take 
the  college  life,  and  so  the  die  was  cast. 

Conscious  that  in  my  somewhat  pro 
longed  absence  from  school  my  knowledge 
of  the  classics  had  become  rather  rusty,  and 
being  still  a  year  below  the  age  set  for 
entering  Brown  University,  I  spent  the 
larger  part  of  a  school  year  in  the  Univer 
sity  Grammar  School  in  Providence.  It 
was  then  conducted  by  Mr.  Merrick  Lyon 
and  Mr.  Henry  S.  Frieze,  afterwards  the 
distinguished  Professor  of  Latin  in  the  Uni 
versity  of  Michigan.  My  studies  were 
mainly  in  the  classes  of  the  latter.  Contact 
with  this  inspiring  teacher  formed  an  epoch 
in  my  intellectual  life,  as  in  that  of  so  many 
other  boys.  He  represented  the  best  type 
of  the  modern  teacher,  at  once  critical  as  a 
grammarian  and  stimulating  with  the  finest 
appreciation  of  whatever  was  choicest  in  the 
classic  masterpieces.  At  first,  as  we  were 
showered  with  questions  such  as  I  had  never 
heard  before,  it  seemed  to  me,  although  the 
reading  of  the  Latin  was  mainly  a  review 
to  me,  that  I  should  never  emerge  from  my 
state  of  ignorance.  But  there  was  such  a 
glow  of  enthusiasm  in  the  instructor  and 
in  the  class,  there  was  such  delight  in  the 
s  [17] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

tension,  in  which  we  were  kept  by  the  daily 
exercises,  that  no  task  seemed  too  great  to 
be  encountered.  Though  in  conjunction 
with  our  reading  we  devoured  the  Latin 
grammar  so  that  by  the  end  of  the  year 
we  could  repeat  almost  the  whole  of  it, 
paradigms,  rules,  and  exceptions  without 
prompting,  the  work  of  mastering  it  did  not 
seem  dry  and  onerous,  for  we  now  felt  how 
the  increasing  accuracy  of  our  knowledge 
of  the  structure  of  the  language  enhanced 
our  enjoyment  of  the  Virgil  and  the  Cicero, 
whose  subtle  and  less  obvious  charms  we 
were  aided  by  our  teacher  to  appreciate. 

I  here  interrupt  the  sketch  of  my  educa 
tion  in  school  to  speak  of  an  important 
event  in  1842,  which  awakened  a  deep  and 
a  permanent  interest  in  me  in  political  and 
constitutional  questions:  I  refer  to  what 
is  known  in  Rhode  Island  history  as  the 
Dorr  war. 

Rhode  Island  retained  the  very  liberal 
charter  she  had  received  from  Charles  II 
as  her  Constitution  down  to  1843.  Under 
that  Constitution  the  right  of  suffrage  was 
limited  to  the  owners  of  land  of  the  value 
of  at  least  one  hundred  and  thirty-four  dol 
lars  and  to  the  oldest  sons  of  such  land 
holders.  So  long  as  the  people  of  the  State 
were  engaged  mainly  in  farming,  in  com- 
[18] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

merce  and  in  whale  fishing,  there  was  no 
serious  discontent  with  this  limitation  of  the 
suffrage.  But  after  the  War  of  1812,  manu 
facturing,  especially  the  manufacture  of 
cotton,  grew  up  rapidly  in  the  State.  By 
1840  the  operatives  and  the  mechanics  in 
the  State,  who  had  no  right  to  vote,  were 
a  numerous  body.  Naturally  enough  they 
sought  an  amendment  to  the  Constitution 
which  would  permit  them  to  have  a  voice 
in  choosing  their  rulers;  but  they  sought 
in  vain.  There,  as  everywhere,  the  exclu 
sive  possessors  of  power  preferred  to  retain 
it.  Therefore  the  petitioners,  seeing  no 
possibility  of  securing  an  amendment  to  the 
constitution  in  accordance  with  the  method 
provided  by  it,  called  a  convention  to  frame 
such  a  constitution  as  they  desired,  nomi 
nated  officers  to  be  voted  for  at  the  same 
time  the  constitution  was  submitted  to  be 
adopted  or  rejected  by  those  on  whom  this 
new  constitution  conferred  the  privilege  of 
suffrage.  The  supporters  of  the  State  gov 
ernment  mainly  absented  themselves  from 
the  polls.  The  new  constitution  was  de 
clared  by  its  friends  to  be  adopted.  Thomas 
W.  Dorr,  a  most  worthy  and  capable  man, 
belonging  to  one  of  the  most  respectable 
families  of  Providence,  was  said  to  be  elected 
governor.  He  at  once  laid  claim  to  the 
[19] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

office  and  demanded  possession  of  the  State 
property.  Then  his  subordinate  officers 
attempted  to  take  possession.  Governor 
King  resisted,  and  so  an  armed  conflict 
came  on.  Those  who  supported  the  regu 
lar  State  authorities  were  known  as  the  Law 
and  Order  Party,  and  the  opponents  as  the 
Dorrites. 

I  am  not  to  recite  the  detailed  history  of 
the  strife,  which  resulted  in  the  defeat  of 
the  Dorrites  and  in  the  trial,  conviction,  and 
imprisonment  of  Mr.  Dorr  on  the  charge 
of  treason.  It  also  led  the  victors  to 
see  that  the  time  had  come  for  enlarging 
the  suffrage.  They  made  a  new  and  more 
liberal  constitution,  under  which  by  the 
payment  of  a  small  registry  or  poll  tax  the 
suffrage  was  opened  to  all  citizens  of  Ameri 
can  birth. 

But  the  issue  which  was  raised  by  the 
original  contest  was  one  of  great  constitu 
tional  interest  and  importance  and  was 
made  so  plain  that  we  schoolboys  could 
comprehend  it  clearly  enough  to  discuss  it 
in  our  essays  and  debates  in  school,  though 
I  believe  great  constitutional  lawyers  are 
not  yet  fully  agreed  upon  the  decision  of 
the  fundamental  question  involved.  The 
question  is  whether  the  citizens  of  a  State 
have  a  right  to  call  a  convention  and  adopt 
[20] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

a  constitution  by  any  other  method  than 
that  prescribed  in  the  Constitution  already 
in  force.  This  was,  of  course,  decided  in 
the  negative  in  Rhode  Island. 

The  feeling  of  opposition  between  the  two 
parties  in  the  state  was  almost  as  acute  as 
that  between  the  Union  men  and  the  Con 
federates  in  the  Border  States  during  the 
Civil  War.  My  father  was  a  Law  and  Or 
der  man,  and  a  member  of  the  Legislature 
during  the  troubles.  The  people  who  lived 
near  us  in  the  adjoining  factory  village 
were  all  Dorrites.  They  gave  us  to  under 
stand  that  they  would  not  aid  us  to  ex 
tinguish  the  flames  if  our  house  took  fire. 
We  happened  to  be  building  a  large  addition 
to  our  kitchen  that  year.  They  dubbed  it 
the  Algerine  kitchen,  as  their  favourite  name 
for  their  opponents  was  Algerines,  because 
of  the  alleged  cruelty  of  the  State  officials 
towards  the  prisoners  they  took.  The 
family  adopted  the  name  for  the  kitchen, 
and  it  was  known  as  "the  Algerine"  so 
long  as  the  house  stood.  As  in  the  South 
after  the  Civil  War,  the  women  retained 
their  animosities  much  longer  than  the  men. 
The  Dorr  War  affected  permanently  the 
political  division  of  men  in  the  State.  The 
Democrats  in  other  States  generally  sym 
pathized  with  Mr.  Dorr.  Therefore  most 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

of  the  Rhode  Island  Democrats  (of  whom 
my  father  was  one)  who  opposed  him,  and 
they  were  numerous,  subsequently  acted 
with  the  Whig  party  during  the  remaining 
years  of  the  existence  of  that  party.  I 
therefore  grew  up  with  an  inherited  attach 
ment  to  the  Whigs,  save  that  like  most  of 
the  Brown  University  students  I  was  led 
by  President  Wayland's  instructions  to 
doubt  the  wisdom  or  justice  of  protective 
tariffs. 

My  college  life  covered  the  period  from 
1845  to  1849.  In  these  days,  when  the 
faculty  numbers  nearly  a  hundred,  it  is 
difficult  to  comprehend  how  a  faculty  of 
seven  men  carried  on  the  institution  with 
vigour  and  success.  I  need  hardly  say  that 
each  one  of  the  seven  was  a  man  of  force 
and  was  admirably  qualified  for  his  special 
work. 

The  youngest  was  Professor  Lincoln.  He 
had  recently  returned  from  Germany,  where 
he  had  pursued  extended  studies  in  the 
classics  and  in  philosophy.  We  had  the 
pleasure  of  reading  Livy  with  him  while 
he  was  preparing  his  edition  of  that  author. 
He  was,  therefore,  brimful  of  enthusiasm  on 
the  subject  and  fired  us  with  much  of  his 
own  spirit.  Although  we  were  studying  a 
dead  language,  no  classroom  was  more 
[22] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

alive  than  this.  He  was  intolerant  of 
sluggishness  or  laziness,  and  often  rebuked 
it  with  a  stinging  word.  "I  have  for 
gotten,"  said  an  indolent  fellow  one  day  in 
reply  to  a  question.  "Forgotten,"  was  the 
sharp  retort  of  the  teacher,  "did  you  ever 
know?"  One  answer  given  him  amused 
him  and  the  class  as  affording  rich  material 
for  his  notes  on  Livy.  We  were  reading 
the  twenty-first  chapter,  which  describes 
the  passage  of  the  Alps  by  Hannibal.  The 
professor  asked  one  of  the  class  why  Hanni 
bal  had  the  elephants  with  him.  With 
great  promptness  the  answer  came,  "to 
draw  up  his  cannon."  The  youth  who 
made  the  reply  was  so  chaffed  by  hfs  class 
mates  that  he  left  Brown  and  went  to 
another  college. 

Professor  Boise,  who  afterwards  at  the 
University  of  Michigan  and  the  Chicago 
Theological  Seminary  won  so  high  a  repu 
tation,  had  charge  of  the  Greek.  He  mani 
fested  the  same  philological  acumen  which 
always  distinguished  him.  But  he  seemed 
to  us  at  that  time  to  dwell  too  much  on  the 
minutiae  of  grammar,  and  not  enough  on  the 
beauties  of  Greek  literature.  The  current 
saying  among  us  was  that  "he  would  die 
for  an  enclitic."  But  it  is  impossible  to 
overstate  the  influence  which  he  and  his 
[23] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

colleague,  Professor  Frieze,  exerted  in  the 
West  through  their  labours  at  the  Uni 
versity  of  Michigan  in  diffusing  love  for 
the  study  of  the  ancient  classics. 

The  librarian,  Professor  Charles  C. 
Jewett,  who  had  been  in  Europe  purchas 
ing  books  for  the  library,  had  charge  of  the 
instruction  in  French  in  my  sophomore 
year.  He  was  greatly  beloved  by  the  stu 
dents.  It  was  with  much  regret  that  we 
saw  him  accept  the  post  of  librarian  of  the 
Smithsonian  Institution.  He  afterwards  be 
came  the  librarian  of  the  Boston  Public 
Library,  and  died  at  a  comparatively  early 
age. 

Fortunately  his  place  in  the  classroom 
was  taken  by  George  W.  Greene,  the  well- 
known  historical  scholar.  His  life  had  been 
chiefly  spent  in  Europe.  The  revolutions 
of  1848  were  raging  while  we  were  under 
him.  Greatly  to  our  delight,  and  I  may 
add  to  our  profit,  his  time  in  the  classroom, 
under  the  provocation  of  questions  from 
us,  was  chiefly  spent  in  discussing  European 
affairs,  and  especially  in  describing  the 
eminent  persons  who  were  conducting  the 
military  or  political  movements.  Not  a 
few  of  these  he  knew  personally.  None  of 
us,  who  hung  upon  his  lips  in  these  hours, 
can  ever  forget  his  narratives.  He  had  the 
[24] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

art  of  the  best  French  raconteur.  I  confess 
that  my  own  intense  interest  in  European 
politics  and  history  dates  from  the  hours  I 
sat  under  the  spell  of  George  Greene's  fine 
talk.  And  who  of  our  American  writers 
has  surpassed  him  in  a  pure  and  flowing 
English  style?  I  am  sure  the  inspiration  of 
the  contact  with  so  finished  a  scholar  was 
lost  on  but  few  of  the  class,  even  though 
the  demands  for  the  details  of  recitation 
were  not  very  exacting. 

Professor  Gammell  had  charge  of  our 
writing  and  speaking  and  also  of  the  work 
in  history.  He  maintained  the  tradition  of 
pure  and  chaste  writing  which,  established 
under  Professor  Goddard,  has,  I  am  happy 
to  believe,  never  been  lost  at  Brown.  He 
was  most  exacting  in  his  demands  upon  the 
writers,  and  no  one  willingly  subjected  him 
self  to  the  humour  and  the  stings  of  his 
pungent  criticism.  Even  those  who  could 
not  at  the  time  receive  them  with  compla 
cency  lived  to  recognize  in  them  with  grati 
tude  "the  wounds  of  a  friend."  No  teacher 
rejoiced  more  than  he  in  the  success  of  his 
students  in  life  or  watched  their  careers 
with  more  interest.  His  course  in  history 
was  fuller  than  that  at  any  other  college 
except  Harvard.  It  was  chiefly  devoted 
to  English  constitutional  history,  though 
[25] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

some  time  was  given  to  American  consti 
tutional  history.  It  called  for  solid  and 
fruitful  work. 

According  to  the  custom  of  those  days  in 
all  the  colleges,  one  man  was  called  to  give 
instruction  in  several  sciences.  This  man 
was  Professor  Chace.  He  taught  chemis 
try,  geology,  botany,  and  physiology.  At 
times  he  also  conducted  classes  in  Butler's 
Analogy.  He  really  ought  to  have  been 
assigned  to  the  teaching  of  philosophy.  His 
natural  bent  was  towards  metaphysics. 
His  mind  was  singularly  acute,  his  mental 
processes  were  most  logical;  his  style  of 
expression  was  absolutely  lucid.  His  in 
struction  was,  therefore,  highly  appreciated, 
though  from  the  brevity  of  the  courses  he 
could  give  us  only  elementary  instruction 
in  science.  Laboratories  had  not  then  been 
introduced  anywhere  in  this  country.  His 
opinion  on  any  subject  carried  great  weight 
with  the  students.  It  was  generally  be 
lieved  that  no  one  could  outwit  him  by 
any  trick  or  device.  Therefore  the  vain 
attempt  was  seldom  made. 

Professor  Caswell,  who  gave  instruction 
in  mathematics,  astronomy,  and  natural 
philosophy,  had  of  all  the  teachers  the 
strongest  hold  on  the  affections  of  the  stu 
dents.  To  him  every  one  who  needed 
[26] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

sympathy  or  counsel  instinctively  went. 
His  great  warm  heart  drew  all  to  him.  He 
had  the  gift  of  making  mathematics  attract 
ive  to  most  students,  and  even  tolerable 
to  that  inconsiderable  number  who  had  no 
gift  or  no  taste  for  the  study.  When  the 
vote  on  recommending  for  degrees  was  to 
be  taken,  he  looked  with  abundant  charity 
on  those  who  had  never  been  able  to  pass 
the  examinations  in  mathematics,  saying 
amiably,  "Let  them  pass.  The  conies  are 
a  feeble  folk."  The  impress  of  his  beauti 
ful  character  upon  all  the  students  was  never 
forgotten  or  entirely  effaced. 

President  Wayland  taught  us  intellectual 
and  moral  philosophy,  political  economy, 
and  (in  a  brief  course)  the  evidences  of 
Christianity.  I  have  met  not  a  few  of  the 
men  whom  the  world  has  called  great;  but 
I  have  seldom  met  a  man  who  so  impressed 
me  with  the  weight  of  his  personality  as  did 
Dr.  Wayland.  After  making  due  allow 
ance  for  the  fact  that  I  was  but  a  youth 
when  I  sat  under  his  teaching,  I  still  think 
that  by  his  power  of  intellect,  of  will,  and 
of  character,  he  deserved  to  be  ranked  with 
the  strongest  men  our  country  has  pro 
duced.  It  may  be  said  of  him  as  of  his 
friend,  Mark  Hopkins,  that  his  published 
writings  do  not  adequately  represent  the 
[27] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

man  as  his  pupils  knew  him.  As  a  teacher 
he  was  unsurpassed.  His  power  of  analyz 
ing  a  subject  into  its  simple  elements  and 
his  power  of  happy  illustration,  often 
humorous,  were  equally  marked.  One- 
fourth  of  my  classmates  were  Southerners. 
When  we  came  to  the  subject  of  slavery  in 
our  study  of  moral  philosophy,  we  discussed 
it  for  three  weeks.  The  robust  personality 
of  Dr.  Wayland  was  felt  throughout  the 
whole  life  of  the  institution.  The  discipline 
which  was  administered  exclusively  by  him 
was  unnecessarily  rigorous,  the  standard 
of  scholarship  was  high,  the  intellectual 
demands  upon  the  students  were  exacting. 
For  those  who  attained  high  rank  the  life 
was  a  strenuous  one.  The  method  pur 
sued  was  specially  calculated  to  cultivate 
the  powers  of  analysis  and  memory.  Where- 
ever  the  subject  permitted  of  such  treat 
ment,  we  were  always  required  to  begin 
the  recitation  by  giving  an  analysis  of  the 
discussion  in  the  text-book  or  the  lecture. 
We  were  then  expected  to  take  up  point 
after  point  of  the  lesson  and  recite  without 
being  aided  by  questions  from  the  teacher. 
There  was  a  general  belief  among  the  stu 
dents,  though  no  formal  statement  to  that 
effect  was  made  by  the  Faculty,  that  they 
would  gain  higher  credit  by  repeating  the 
[28] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

language  of  the  book  than  by  reporting  the 
substance  of  the  thought  in  their  own  lan 
guage.  By  dint  of  continued  memorizing, 
some  of  the  students  attained  to  a  remark 
able  development  of  the  verbal  memory. 
I  think  that  nearly  one-fourth  of  the  men 
in  my  class  in  their  senior  year  used  to 
learn  in  two  hours  —  and  that  after  an 
indigestible  dinner  in  Commons  —  fifteen 
pages  of  Smyth's  "Lectures  on  History,"  so 
that  they  could  repeat  them  with  little 
variation  from  the  text.  The  training  in 
analysis  was  of  very  high  value  in  teaching 
men  to  seize  and  hold  the  main  points  in  an 
argument  and  to  make  points  distinctly  in 
the  construction  of  a  discourse.  On  look 
ing  back,  I  think  most  of  the  old  students 
will  agree  that  too  much  value  was  attached 
to  memoriter  recitations. 

But  none  the  less,  many  of  them  have 
found  great  advantage  in  life  in  the  facility 
which  they  acquired  in  retaining  with  accu 
racy  what  they  read  or  write.  The  reaction 
against  training  the  memory  has  probably 
gone  too  far  in  these  later  days.  The  natu 
ral  sciences  were  taught  as  skilfully  as  they 
well  could  be  in  an  overcrowded  curriculum, 
and  in  days  when  laboratory  methods  were 
not  employed.  Personally  I  gained  great 
advantage  by  being  permitted  to  assist  the 
[29] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Professor  of  Chemistry  for  two  years  in 
preparing  the  experiments  which  he  made 
before  the  class.  In  the  ancient  languages, 
certainly  in  Greek,  I  think  the  professors 
who  taught  us  would  now  say  too  much 
time  was  given  to  grammatical  and  philo 
logical  detail  and  too  little  to  rapid  reading. 
But  their  method  was  then  generally  in 
vogue,  and  the  teaching  was  excellent  of  its 
kind. 

To  nearly  every  student  the  most  impor 
tant  event  in  his  college  life  in  those  days 
was  the  contact  with  the  vigorous  and 
suggestive  mind  of  Dr.  Wayland,  in  the 
senior  classroom,  and  especially  during  the 
study  of  moral  philosophy.  It  is  difficult 
for  those  who  know  Dr.  Wayland  only  by 
his  writings,  valuable  as  some  of  them  are, 
to  understand  how  he  made  so  deep  an 
impression  on  his  pupils.  He  was  not  a 
great  scholar;  he  was  imperious,  sometimes 
prejudiced;  but  his  mind  was  singularly 
penetrating  and  lucid.  He  insisted  on  the 
clearest  and  sharpest  definition  of  terms 
before  answering  a  question  or  engaging 
in  a  discussion,  and  thus  often  made  the 
inquirer  answer  his  own  question  by  an 
accurate  definition  or  rendered  the  dis 
cussion  superfluous.  Withal,  he  had  the 
keenest  wit  and  a  thorough  knowledge  of 
[30] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

men,  especially  of  students.  He  had  the 
happiest  way,  often  a  homely  way,  of  stat 
ing  an  important  truth  so  that  it  remained 
forever  fixed  in  the  mind  of  the  hearer. 
There  was,  too,  beyond  all  this,  a  certain 
power  of  personal  presence,  a  force  of  char 
acter,  a  moral  strength,  which  lent  a  tre 
mendous  weight  to  even  his  commonest 
words.  I  have  met  in  my  day  not  a  few 
distinguished  men;  but  I  recall  none  who 
have  so  impressed  me  with  their  power  of 
personality,  none  who  have  uttered  so 
many  wise  words  which  I  recall  every  week 
to  my  advantage  and  help  in  the  duties  of 
my  daily  life.  He  was  a  very  inapt  pupil 
who  passed  from  under  Dr.  Wayland's 
instruction  without  catching  something 
of  his  catholic  spirit,  his  passionate  love 
of  soul-liberty,  and  his  earnest  Christian 
principle. 

The  following  incidents  will  give  one  an 
idea  of  his  manner  in  the  classroom.  One 
day  a  rather  conceited  man  said  in  the 
class  when  Dr.  Wayland  was  speaking  of 
the  great  wisdom  of  the  Proverbs  in  the 
Scriptures,  "I  do  not  think  there  is  any 
thing  very  remarkable  in  the  Proverbs. 
They  are  rather  commonplace  remarks  of 
common  people."  "Very  well,"  replied  the 
Doctor,  "make  one." 

[31] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

The  Doctor's  son,  Heman  Lincoln  Way- 
land,  one  of  my  classmates,  inherited  from 
his  father  a  very  keen  wit.  The  passes  be 
tween  father  and  son  were  often  very  enter 
taining  to  the  class.  One  day  when  we  were 
considering  a  chapter  in  the  father's  text 
book  on  Moral  Philosophy,  Lincoln  arose 
with  an  expression  of  great  solemnity  and 
respect  and  said,  "Sir,  I  would  like  to  pro 
pound  a  question."  "Well,  my  son,  go 
on,"  was  the  reply.  "Well,  sir,"  said  the 
son,  "in  the  learned  author's  work  which 
we  are  now  perusing  I  observe  the  follow 
ing  remark,"  and  then  he  quoted.  The 
class  saw  that  fun  was  at  hand,  and  began 
to  laugh.  "Well,  what  of  that?"  said  the 
father,  with  a  merry  twinkle  in  his  eye. 
"Why,  this,"  continued  the  son.  "In  an 
other  work  of  the  same  learned  author, 
entitled  'On  the  Limitations  of  Human 
Responsibility,'  I  find  the  following  pas 
sage.'  He  then  quoted.  Clearly  the  two 
passages  were  irreconcilable.  The  boys  were 
delighted  to  see  that  the  father  was  in  a 
trap,  and  broke  into  loud  laughter.  The 
Doctor's  eyes  twinkled  more  merrily,  as 
he  asked,  "Well,  what  of  that?"  "Why," 
said  the  son  with  the  utmost  gravity,  "it 
has  occurred  to  me  that  I  should  like  to 
know  how  the  learned  author  reconciles  the 
[32] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

two  statements."  "Oh,"  said  the  father, 
"that  is  simple  enough.  It  only  shows  that 
since  he  wrote  the  first  book  the  learned 
author  has  learned  something." 

And  this  remark  reveals  one  of  the  strik 
ing  characteristics  of  Dr.  Wayland's  mind. 
It  was  ever  growing.  It  cost  him  no 
struggle  to  change  his  opinion  when  he  had 
good  ground  for  so  doing.  He  imbued  his 
students  with  this  open-mindedness.  He 
encouraged  the  fullest  and  freest  discussion 
in  the  class.  The  passage  in  Milton's  Areo- 
pagitica  about  letting  truth  grapple  with 
error  was  often  on  his  lips. 

During  the  spring  of  my  Sophomore  year 
there  arose  among  the  students  a  deep  inter 
est  in  personal  religion.  Though  like  most 
school  boys  I  had  thought  with  some  seri 
ousness  upon  religious  subjects,  I  had  been 
repelled  by  the  extravagances  and  excite 
ments  of  so-called  revivals  in  the  country 
towns  and  villages,  which  apparently  ap 
pealed  to  ignorant  and  emotional  persons 
rather  than  to  the  rational  and  intelligent. 
But  here  my  thoughtful  and  even  my 
merry  companions  addressed  themselves 
calmly  but  earnestly  to  the  great  question 
of  determining  their  duty  to  God  and  of 
deciding  with  what  aim  and  what  spirit 
they  should  live.  The  high  resolves  then 
4  [33] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

formed  shaped  the  careers  of  a  good  num 
ber  of  the  most  conspicuous  men  in  college. 
I  think  they  would  generally  testify  that 
they  were  greatly  aided  in  that  critical 
period  of  their  lives  by  the  wise  counsels  of 
Dr.  Caswell  and  Dr.  Wayland.  Perhaps 
at  no  other  time  did  the  latter  so  deeply 
impress  the  students  as  when,  standing  in 
the  midst  of  them  in  the  old  chapel,  and 
resting  one  foot  on  a  seat  and  his  arm  on 
the  raised  knee,  he  looked  into  their  faces 
with  those  piercing  eyes  and  spoke  with 
fatherly  tenderness  of  the  divine  love. 
With  what  pathos  he  repeated  the  parable 
of  the  Prodigal  Son.  None  of  his  published 
sermons  gives  one  any  adequate  idea  of  the 
power  of  those  heart-to-heart  talks. 

But  to  us  country  boys,  as  we  entered 
upon  college  life,  nothing  was  more  fasci 
nating  and  more  novel  and  more  helpful 
than  the  access  to  well-furnished  libraries 
and  the  society  of  students  of  marked 
ability  and  scholarly  enthusiasm.  The  boys 
who  are  reared  in  the  neighbourhood  of 
libraries  can  have  no  appreciation  of  the 
sensations  which  we  country  lads,  whose 
supply  of  books  had  been  the  most  meagre 
imaginable,  but  whose  thirst  for  reading 
was  insatiable,  experienced  in  being  ush 
ered  into  a  large  library  and  told  that  all 
[34] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

;. 

these  books  were  now  at  our  service.  I 
sometimes  tremble  to  think  what  an  on 
slaught  we  made  upon  the  crowded  shelves. 
Fortunately  association  with  older  students 
soon  helped  us  learn  how  and  what  to  read. 
For  there  was  at  that  time  —  and,  I  hope, 
always  —  in  Brown  a  profound  interest  in 
literary  culture.  The  students,  with  few 
exceptions,  lodged  in  the  dormitories,  and 
took  their  meals  in  Commons  Hall.  They 
went  little  into  society  in  the  city.  They 
were  thus  drawn  very  close  to  each  other. 
The  enthusiasm  of  the  more  gifted  and  ac 
complished  scholars  was  caught  in  some 
degree  by  nearly  all.  I  remember  that  men 
were  divided  as  Carlyleists  or  anti-Carlyle- 
ists,  Coleridgeians  or  anti-Coleridgeians, 
and  so  on,  and  that  literary,  historic,  and 
philosophic  theories  were  as  hotly  discussed 
as  the  current  political  questions  of  the  day. 
Not  wishing  to  be  unduly  laudator  temporis 
acti,  I  am  sure  that  whoever  examines  the 
triennial  catalogue  of  Brown  for  the  years 
from  1845  to  1852,  will  see  that  the  college 
contained  within  its  walls  in  those  years  a 
good  number,  perhaps  an  exceptionally 
large  number,  of  men  whose  lives  have 
shown  that  it  must  have  been  a  high  privi 
lege  to  be  intimately  associated  with  them 
in  the  companionship  of  student  life.  The 
[35] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

j* 

society  of  some  of  them  has  been  one  of  the 
chief  factors  in  my  own  education,  both  in 
college  and  afterward,  and  one  of  the  chief 
delights  of  life.  On  the  whole  I  think  that 
any  student  in  Brown  University  who  did 
not  graduate  in  those  days  with  a  mind  well 
disciplined  for  entering  upon  any  worthy 
career  was  himself  greatly  at  fault. 

The  careers  of  the  men  who  were  in  col 
lege  in  my  time  furnish  the  best  proof  of 
the  value  of  the  training  then  given.  I  may 
name  a  few  of  one  hundred  and  forty  stu 
dents  who  were  my  college  mates.  In  the 
class  of  1846  were  Thomas  Durfee,  Chief 
Justice  of  Rhode  Island,  a  man  of  poetic 
gifts  as  well  as  of  legal  attainments;  Frank 
lin  J.  Dickman,  a  Justice  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  Ohio,  a  man  of  fine  literary  taste 
and  acquirements;  Samuel  S.  Cox,  for 
many  years  a  prominent  member  of  Con 
gress,  first  from  Ohio,  and  afterwards  from 
New  York,  and  subsequently  United  States 
Minister  to  Turkey,  a  gifted  speaker;  and 
Francis  Way  land,  Dean  of  the  Yale  Law 
School.  In  the  class  of  1847  were  Profes 
sor  George  P.  Fisher,  of  the  Yale  Theologi 
cal  School,  distinguished  as  a  writer  in 
ecclesiastical  history,  and  James  P.  Boyce, 
President  of  the  Southern  Baptist  Theologi 
cal  School  at  Louisville,  Kentucky.  In 
[36] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

the  class  of  1848  was  Pendleton  Murrah, 
Governor  of  Texas  in  the  last  years  of  the 
Civil  War.  In  my  own  class,  1849,  were 
Benjamin  F.  Thurston,  one  of  the  leading 
patent  lawyers  in  the  country;  James  Til- 
linghast,  long  the  leading  lawyer  in  Rhode 
Island  on  real  estate;  Julian  Hartridge,  a 
most  eloquent  member  of  the  Confederate 
Congress,  and  afterwards  of  the  Union  Con 
gress,  and  Rowland  Hazard,  one  of  the  most 
eminent  business  men  of  his  time  and  en 
dowed  with  superior  scientific  and  literary 
gifts.  In  the  class  of  1850  were  James  O. 
Murray,  a  prominent  Presbyterian  divine 
and  Professor  and  Dean  in  Princeton  Col 
lege,  and  Edward  L.  Pierce,  conspicuous  in 
public  affairs  in  Massachusetts  and  biog 
rapher  of  Charles  Sumner.  In  the  class  of 
1851  was  Professor  J.  L.  Diman  whom  I 
regard  as  one  of  the  most  gifted  men  I  have 
known,  the  most  conspicuous  teacher  of 
history  of  his  generation,  but  who  died 
while  in  the  very  prime  of  his  strength. 

We  students  in  Brown  believed  that  there 
was  no  better  teaching  in  any  college  than 
in  ours.  Since  reading  Senator  Hoar's 
description  of  the  instruction  at  Harvard 
at  the  same  time,  and  Andrew  D.  White's 
description  of  the  instruction  at  Yale  a 
little  later,  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  our 
[37] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

impression  was  correct.  The  one  college 
teacher  of  that  time  whose  instruction  took 
rank  with  that  of  Dr.  Wayland  was  Mark 
Hopkins,  President  of  Williams  College. 

Immediately  after  leaving  college  I  had 
an  experience  not  unusual  for  young  gradu 
ates.  It  was  necessary  for  me  to  do  some 
thing  for  my  maintenance;  but  I  found 
nowhere  any  call  for  my  services.  I  had 
left  the  warm  and  genial  atmosphere  of  col 
lege  life  to  plunge  into  the  great  busy  world 
and  realized  what  Schiller  meant  when  he 
said  he  stretched  out  his  arms  to  serve  the 
world  and  found  he  had  clasped  a  lump  of 
ice.  The  great,  busy  world  went  on  its  way 
and  apparently  had  no  use  for  me  and  no 
sympathy  with  me.  The  contrast  between 
the  warm  companionships  of  college  days 
and  this  sense  of  loneliness  and  isolation  and 
uselessness  made  the  experience  of  those  few 
weeks  following  graduation  the  most  painful 
of  my  life.  The  recollection  of  it  has  led  me 
often  to  warn  students  against  being  too 
much  discouraged  by  a  similar  fortune. 

For  in  due  time  I  was  invited  to  take  the 
place  of  Assistant  Librarian  in  Brown  Uni 
versity  for  a  part  of  each  day,  and  to 
spend  another  part  in  teaching  a  boy  who 
was  prevented  by  weakness  of  his  eyes  from 
the  study  of  books.  The  compensation  was 
[38] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

very  modest,  but  it  gave  me  the  great  de 
light  of  returning  to  the  society  of  college 
friends  and  teachers,  and  the  equal  delight 
of  having  free  access  to  the  library,  and, 
incidentally,  of  guiding  to  a  considerable 
degree  the  reading  of  undergraduates. 
During  the  work  of  classifying  and  arrang 
ing  the  books  in  the  library  an  amusing 
incident  occurred,  deserving  perhaps  to  be 
recorded  among  the  "Curiosities  of  Liter 
ature."  One  of  the  staff,  coming  upon 
Edgeworth's  book  on  "Irish  Bulls,"  cata 
logued  and  placed  it  among  the  works  on 
agriculture.  This  was  itself  one  of  the  best 
of  Irish  Bulls. 

I  read  aloud  from  one  to  two  hours  a  day 
interesting   books    to    my  pupil,   and  was 
surprised  to  find  how  many  volumes  we 
finished    by    reading    thus    for    about    six 
months.1    I  gave  a  part  of  my  leisure  hours 

I 1  take  pleasure  in  saying  that  this  receptive  pupil, 
with  whom  I  maintained  the  relations  of  the  most  cordial 
friendship  until  his  death,  was  Thomas  Poynton  Ives,  son 
of  Moses  Brown  Ives,  of  the  house  of  Brown  and  Ives. 
When  the  Civil  War  broke  out,  young  Ives  placed  his 
yacht  at  the  service  of  the  government,  enlisted  as  the 
commander  of  it,  equipped  it  for  service,  and  was  sta 
tioned  in  the  Chesapeake.     He  married  Miss  Motley, 
daughter  of  Motley  the  historian,  but  did  not  long  sur 
vive  the  marriage.     She  afterward  married  Sir  William 
Vernon  Harcourt,  the  distinguished  English  statesman. 

[39] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

to  my  classical  studies,  re-reading  "Virgil" 
and  reading  for  the  first  time  Demos 
thenes'  "Oration  on  the  Crown." 

In  the  spring  of  1850  I  took  a  severe  cold, 
which  seriously  affected  my  throat.  Never 
having  been  ill,  it  did  not  occur  to  me  that 
I  ought  to  refrain  for  a  time  from  oral 
instruction  to*  my  pupil.  I  continued  to 
talk  and  read  five  hours  a  day  to  him  until 
I  became  too  hoarse  to  continue.  I  thus 
fastened  an  inflammation  on  my  throat, 
from  which  I  have  never  fully  recovered. 
I  returned  to  my  father's  house  and  spent 
the  summer  in  the  attempt  to  recuperate, 
but  was  only  partially  successful.  Mean 
time  my  classmate  and  intimate  friend, 
Rowland  Hazard,  had  been  suffering  from 
hemorrhage  of  the  lungs.  His  father,  Row 
land  G.  Hazard,  a  prosperous  manufacturer, 
who  afterwards  became  somewhat  noted  for 
writings  on  philosophic  subjects,  and  who 
in  early  life  had  travelled  on  business 
errands  extensively  in  the  South,  thought 
that  it  would  be  beneficial  to  his  son  to 
make  a  journey  on  horseback  through  the 
South.  But  he  deemed  it  hardly  prudent 
for  the  young  man  to  go  alone.  So,  know 
ing  my  condition,  he  invited  me  to  accom 
pany  his  son  on  this  southern  journey,  and 
I  accepted  the  invitation  with  pleasure. 
[40] 


II 

THE  SOUTHERN  JOURNEY 

SETTING  out  on  my  southern  journey,  I 
left  home  October  5,  1850,  and  went  to 
Peace  Dale.  Tuesday  evening  we  started 
for  Philadelphia  via  New  York.  We  spent 
some  days  in  Philadelphia,  where  my  friend 
had  numerous  relatives.  During  our  stay 
we  heard  Albert  Barnes  preach  a  very  plain 
and  simple  sermon,  somewhat  in  the  style 
of  his  then  famous  notes  on  the  Gospels. 
We  also  heard  Jenny  Lind,  then  on  her  first 
tour,  sing.  I  have  never  been  so  impressed 
by  singing  as  by  her  rendering  of  "I  know 
that  my  Redeemer  liveth."  Philadelphia 
had  many  objects  of  interest  to  me,  Inde 
pendence  Hall,  the  Mint,  the  Schuylkill, 
Fairmount,  etc. 

We  got  our  outfit  of  saddles  and  bridles 
and  went  via  Baltimore  to  Harper's  Ferry 
and  Winchester.  When  we  had  planned  to 
set  out  on  horseback  for  a  journey  through 
the  South,  we  had  clothed  ourselves  in  suits 
of  heavy  gray  cloth,  and  steeple-crowned, 
brick-coloured  hats,  known  as  California 
hats.  We  had  india-rubber  ponchos  for  use 
[41] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

in  rainy  weather.  Our  effects  were  packed 
in  saddle  bags.  We  purchased  two  excel 
lent  horses  here. 

We  had  letters  to  some  intelligent  men 
in  Winchester.  From  conversation  with 
them  we  received  the  impression  that  the 
more  thoughtful  regarded  slavery  as  eco 
nomically  of  no  advantage  to  that  section; 
but  they  did  not  relish  the  attitude  of  the 
North  in  criticizing  them  for  continuing  to 
maintain  it.  Some  of  them  seemed  to  be  in 
a  rather  confused  state  of  mind,  admiring 
the  prosperity  of  the  North,  expressing  de 
votion  to  the  Union,  but  defending  their 
course  in  retaining  their  negroes  in  bondage.1 

1  One  gentleman,  who  had  attended  the  annual  meeting 
of  the  Railroad  Company  at  Harper's  Ferry,  and  had  in 
dulged  rather  freely  in  the  beverages  offered,  amused  us 
by  a  sort  of  speech,  with  which  he  welcomed  us.  The 
following  are  extracts : 

"Gentlemen,  we  welcome  you  to  Virginia.  It  is  all 
important  that  you  go  back  with  right  impressions,  that 
you  should  go  back  Union  men.  Now  my  niggers  live 
the  same  as  I  do,  not  at  the  same  table,  but  have  the  same 
food.  Every  dish  is  carried  for  them  into  an  adjoining 
room,  a  plastered  room,  Gents. 

"What  is  the  use  then  of  kicking  up  such  a  fuss  in  the 
kitchen?  Why  don't  we  say  that  you  sha'n't  have  gray 
cattle  or  no  cattle  or  yellow  cattle?  What  business  is  that 
to  us?  Now  would  it  not  be  a  pretty  spectacle  to  see  the 
bayonets  at  Springfield  clashing  with  those  made  at 
Harper's  Ferry?  Would  it  not  be  sublime,  Gents  of  the 

[42] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

We  were  deeply  impressed  with  the  pros 
perity  of  the  Shenandoah  Valley  as  we 
travelled  along  its  great  highway.  Wagons 
laden  with  corn  and  the  other  products  of 

North,  to  see  you  and  me  sticking  each  other  in  the  abdo 
men?  What  do  you  want  to  do  it  for?  New  England, 
God  bless  her!  We  love  her.  All  the  goods  I  sell  come 
from  New  England.  She  is  the  bone  and  the  sinew  and 
the  back  and  the  breast  and  the  head  and  the  all.  We 
love  her,  we  do.  We  want  you  to  go  North  with  right 
impressions. 

"Then  there  is  a  man  up  above  here  that  has  two  hun 
dred  nappy-heads.  Now,  Gents,  that  seems  strange  to 
you.  Yet  they  fare  well.  Now  here's  my  Jim.  What 
is  the  matter  with  him?  That's  Jim,  sleeps  eighteen  hours 
out  of  the  twenty-four.  Gents,  you  can  see  plenty  of 
pretty  girls  in  Virginia,  with  Virginia  fortunes,  ten  niggers, 
and  if  you  want  to  marry  one  you  can  do  it  fast  enough. 
You  tell  her  you  are  an  abolitionist.  She  kisses  you  a  few 
times,  says  the  niggers  are  doing  well  enough.  Pretty 
soon  you  would  fight  for  them  niggers.  It  is  so,  Gents. 
Now,  Gentlemen  of  the  North,  why  can't  we  keep  united? 
The  Jews  were  formerly  the  chosen  people  of  God.  Now 
if  you'll  look  in  Deuteronomy,  Exodus,  somewhere  along 
there,  you'll  find  they  disobeyed  God  and  He  set  his  face 
against  them  and  turned  to  the  Gentile  nations  of  the 
West.  We  are  the  West,  Gents.  We  are  a  great  and 
growing  country.  We  are  E  Pluribus  Unum,  One  out  of 
many.  God  bless  us!  What  is  the  use  then,  I  say,  of 
kicking  up  a  row  in  the  kitchen?  We  of  the  South  want 
you  of  the  North  to  go  back  with  right  impressions,  Union 
men.  Amicitia,  Amor,  et  Veritas.  Love  your  country 
and  be  true;  the  translation  of  that  is,  Gents,  love 
America  and  be  true.'* 

[43] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

the  fertile  farms  passed  on  in  continuous  pro 
cession  towards  Winchester,  the  terminus 
of  the  railway  from  Harper's  Ferry.  We 
visited  Weyer's  Cave,  which  though  not  so 
extensive  as  the  better  known  Mammoth 
Cave  in  Kentucky,  was  as  beautiful  and 
striking  to  us  who  had  never  seen  such  a 
geological  formation.  From  Wraynesboro 
we  crossed  the  Blue  Ridge  by  the  Rockfish 
Gap.  Under  Monsieur  Crozet,  a  French 
engineer,  the  men  were  driving  the  tunnel 
for  the  railway.  Our  immediate  destination 
was  Charlottesville.  We  wished  to  visit 
Monticello,  the  home  of  Jefferson,  and  the 
University  of  Virginia. 

We  reached  Turpin's  Hotel  in  the  after 
noon.  Our  costume  was  hardly  calculated 
to  impress  strangers  with  the  idea  that  we 
were  entitled  to  special  civilities  at  their 
hands.  In  fact  we  had  generally  been  taken 
by  the  men  we  had  met  on  the  road  for 
drovers,  who  were  seeking  cattle,  or  for  bill 
collectors,  sent  out  by  northern  firms  to  dun 
their  debtors.  More  than  once  those  who 
held  the  latter  theory  put  whip  to  their 
horses  to  escape  from  us. 

But  in  the  evening  we  had  a  fine  example 

of   Virginia   hospitality.     In   some   way   a 

group  of  gentlemen  sitting  near  us  in  the 

hotel  learned  the  object  of  our  visit  to  the 

[44] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

town,  and  notwithstanding  our  costume 
proffered  their  services  to  make  our  visit 
agreeable.  The  oldest  of  them,  Mr.  Wil 
liam  Gilmer,  widely  known  as  we  soon 
learned  as  Billy  Gilmer,  introduced  himself, 
saying  that  he  had  received  courtesies  in 
New  England  and  that  he  and  his  friends 
would  be  glad  to  entertain  us.  He  intro 
duced  us  to  them  and  immediately  began  to 
lay  out  a  programme  of  hospitalities  which 
would  have  occupied  us  for  a  week  or  ten 
days.  :<You  will  go  to  dinner  with  me  to 
night,  to-morrow  we  will  go  to  Southold's, 
the  next  day  we  will  have  a  fox  hunt,"  and 
so  on.  We  were  obliged  to  decline  this 
kind  offer;  but  we  told  him  we  should  be 
obliged  to  him  if  he  could  help  us  gain 
access  to  Monticello,  since  we  had  heard  it 
was  closed  to  visitors.  "Oh,  yes,"  he  re 
plied,  "I  will  go  with  you  to-morrow 
morning.  As  a  child  I  grew  up  a  neighbour 
of  Jefferson  and  was  often  in  his  house.  I 
will  see  that  you  get  in." 

The  next  morning  he  appeared  at  the 
appointed  hour.  Monticello  is  about  two 
miles  from  the  town.  As  we  rode  up  the 
hill  he  told  us  some  interesting  stories 
about  Mr.  Jefferson,  which  I  here  give  on 
his  authority. 

The  view  from  the  hill  commands  the  two 
[45] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

fertile  counties  of  Fluvanna  and  Louisa. 
"If  in  the  place  of  them  there  had  been  a 
lake,"  Jefferson  used  to  say,  "this  would 
have  been  the  finest  situation  on  earth." 
"And,"  added  Mr.  Gilmer,  "if  he  could 
have  had  his  way,  he  would  have  sunk  them 
both  in  the  lake." 

Pointing  to  a  wooded  peak  rising  behind 
Monticello,  he  said  that  Mr.  Jefferson  once 
planned  a  sawmill  to  be  placed  there  and 
driven  by  a  windmill,  since  there  is  always 
a  breeze  up  there.  When  some  wood-man 
asked  how  he  would  get  the  logs  up  there  to 
be  sawed,  he  was  nonplussed. 

Mr.  Jefferson,  who  was  much  interested 
in  scientific  matters,  had  been  led  to  adopt 
the  theory  that  the  western  prairies  were 
almost  treeless  because  the  mastodons,  be 
lieved  to  be  arboraceous,  had  gnawed  down 
and  consumed  the  trees  which  originally 
grew  on  them.  A  wag  of  the  neighbour 
hood,  Billy  Preston,  was  aware  of  Jeffer 
son's  views  on  this  subject.  On  a  journey 
which  Preston  made  to  Illinois,  he  wrote  to 
Jefferson  that  he  had  found  a  remarkable 
confirmation  of  his  theory.  He  had  come 
upon  the  remains  of  a  mastodon  in  a  slough, 
in  which  the  animal  had  been  mired,  and 
just  where  the  stomach  must  have  been 
there  was  a  great  mass  of  what  appeared  to 
[46] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

be  sawdust,  evidently  the  tree  which  had 
been  eaten.  Mr.  Jefferson  was  so  gratified 
at  this  news  that  he  at  once  wrote  a  Memoir 
on  the  matter  and  sent  it  to  his  scientific 
correspondents  in  France. 

We  passed  the  monument  to  Jefferson 
just  before  we  reached  the  entrance  to  the 
grounds.  It  was  badly  mutilated  by  visit 
ors  who  had  broken  off  chips  of  the  stone 
as  souvenirs.  The  steward  in  charge  of  the 
estate  happened  to  be  near  the  gate  which, 
however,  was  locked.  Mr.  Gilmer  shouted 
to  him  from  afar  in  the  most  familiar  man 
ner;  but  as  we  reached  the  gate,  the  stew 
ard  informed  us  that  Captain  Levy,  the 
naval  officer,  into  whose  possession  the 
estate  had  come  through  his  marriage,  had 
left  the  strictest  orders  that  during  his  ab 
sence  in  Europe  no  one  should  be  admitted 
to  the  house.  We  had  heard  that  Captain 
Levy  had  taken  offence  because  he  had  not 
been  received  as  persona  grata  by  his 
neighbours.  On  the  announcement  by  the 
steward  of  this  prohibition,  Mr.  Gilmer 
evinced  deep  anguish.  "This  is  really  too 
bad,"  he  exclaimed.  "Here  are  two  sons  of 
old  acquaintances  and  friends  of  Mr.  Jef 
ferson,  who  have  ridden  hundreds  of  miles 
to  pay  a  tribute  to  his  memory,  to  visit  his 
residence  as  a  sacred  shrine,  and  now  they 
[47] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

are  to  be  shut  out.  If  Mr.  Jefferson  were 
alive,  how  he  would  have  greeted  them! 
Oh  no!  this  cannot  be,  my  good  friend. 
Allow  me,  sir,  to  introduce  you  to  Mr. 
Charles  Francis  Adams,  the  son  of  John 
Quincy  Adams,  and  to  Mr.  Fletcher  Web 
ster,  the  son  of  Daniel  Webster!"  As  it 
happened  he  called  me,  who  was  about  the 
size  of  Mr.  Adams,  Mr.  Webster,  and  Mr. 
Hazard,  who  was  six  feet  high,  Mr.  Adams. 
He  had  not  notified  us  of  his  intention  to 
play  this  trick,  and  it  required  our  best 
efforts  to  play  the  parts  assigned  us  with 
out  breaking  into  laughter.  The  steward 
was  evidently  a  little  puzzled  to  explain  to 
himself  how  so  distinguished  men  should 
appear  in  such  costume.  But  he  yielded 
to  Mr.  Gilmer's  request  with  the  remark 
that  he  supposed  Captain  Levy  would  not 
object  to  the  admission  of  such  visitors. 
We  were  shown  about  the  grounds  and  the 
house.  In  Jefferson's  sleeping  room  was 
the  bed  on  which  he  died,  July  4,  1826. 
On  the  mantel  were  two  small  statues  of 
him.  In  the  dining  room  was  a  bust  of 
Voltaire.  The  furniture  of  the  house  was 
wrapped  in  coverings.  In  the  silence  and 
the  dim  light  which  was  admitted  through 
the  half -closed  shutters,  the  house  in  which 
so  many  statesmen  had  discussed  the  grav- 
[48] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

est  public  questions  seemed  in  fact  a  tomb. 
For  once  even  the  merry  talk  of  our  friend 
Gilmer  fell  with  a  certain  dissonance  on  the 
ear. 

In  the  afternoon  we  rode  out  to  the  Uni 
versity.  A  student,  Mr.  Chalmers,  intro 
duced  us  to  the  Librarian,  Mr.  Wirtenbaker, 
who  received  us  very  cordially.  The  stu 
dent's  dormitories  and  the  lecture  halls, 
planned  as  was  the  University  itself  by 
Mr.  Jefferson,  still  stand  as  we  saw  them 
on  two  sides  of  the  beautiful  Green,  though 
other  and  finer  structures  have  since  been 
added. 

Perhaps  this  is  the  best  place  to  say  that 
I  attended  the  inauguration  of  President 
Alderman,  in  the  spring  of  1905.  Being 
invited  to  speak  at  the  banquet,  I  found 
that  there  were  few,  if  any,  persons  present 
whose  memory  of  the  town  and  the  Uni 
versity  reached  back  as  far  as  mine.  When 
I  gave  some  of  the  reminiscences  above 
recorded,  the  audience  seemed  highly  enter 
tained,  especially  by  my  report  of  the  acts 
and  stories  of  "Billy  Gilmer,"  the  reputa 
tion  of  whose  wit  and  humour  has  survived 
in  that  region. 

We  crossed  the  Blue  Ridge  to  Staunton. 
On  this  journey  we  first  saw  negro  women 
working  in  the  fields.  In  Staunton  we 
s  [49] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

visited  the  State  Institution  for  the  Blind 
and  for  the  Deaf  and  Dumb,  and  the  State 
Lunatic  Asylum. '  From  Staunton  we  went 
to  Lexington,  then  and  afterwards  noted 
for  the  State  Military  Institute,  at  which 
some  of  the  most  distinguished  confederate 
officers  were  educated.  Stonewall  Jackson 
was  a  professor  here  when  the  Civil  War 
broke  out. 

My  journey  up  the  Shenandoah  Valley 
proved  of  essential  service  to  me  in  my 
editorial  work  during  the  war,  because 
that  valley  was  the  scene  of  so  many  mili 
tary  operations  of  importance,  which  I  had 
occasion  to  discuss. 

From  Lexington  we  went  to  the  Natural 
Bridge,  where  the  boldness  of  the  scenery 
surpassed  our  expectations.  We  started 
from  the  bridge  for  the  Balcony  Falls  on 
the  James  River.  On  our  journey,  when  we 
supposed  we  must  be  approaching  our  des 
tination,  we  inquired  of  a  man  whom  we 
met  how  far  it  was  to  Balcony  Falls.  He 
looked  at  us  in  astonishment.  He  said  he 
had  never  heard  of  them.  We  expressed 
our  surprise  at  this,  when  suddenly  he  put 
his  hand  to  his  forehead  and  exclaimed, 
"Oh,  you  mean  Bel-co-ny  (with  the  accent 
on  the  second  syllable)  Falls,"  and  then  gave 
us  the  desired  information.  We  found 
[50] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

them,  a  picturesque  spot,  where  the  river 
breaks  through  a  narrow  gorge  filled  with 
rocks.  Passing  a  tollgate  on  our  ride,  we 
asked  the  gatekeeper,  a  woman,  how  much 
we  had  to  pay  for  two  of  us.  She  replied 
that  the  toll  was  three  cents  for  one,  but 
she  was  unable  to  reckon  the  total  amount 
for  two.  As  my  companion  was  noted  in 
college  for  his  mathematical  attainments,  I 
called  on  him  to  solve  the  problem,  which 
he  did,  and  we  passed  through. 

By  almost  impassable  roads  and  lanes  we 
went  to  the  Peaks  of  Otter.  We  forded  one 
stream  thirty -two  times  in  going  seven 
miles.  The  views  from  these  peaks  were 
very  extensive  and  impressive.  None,  we 
were  assured,  on  all  the  mountain  ranges  of 
Virginia  are  more  so.  We  paused  a  few 
hours  in  Lynchburg,  which  then  had  about 
eight  hundred  inhabitants.  Its  chief  trade 
was  in  tobacco.  We  went  next  to  Dan 
ville.  On  the  way  we  passed  the  Isle  of 
Pines,  lying  in  Staunton  River,  and  formerly 
owned  by  Patrick  Henry.  We  also  passed 
two  small  villages  known  by  the  significant 
names  of  Hard  Times  and  Scuffletown.  We 
were  told  by  one  of  the  natives  that  in  that 
region  they  raised  "a  right  smart  chance  of 
sheep  and  snorting  crops  of  tobacco."  But 
the  soil  was  really  thin  and  in  a  large  part 
[51] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

of  our  route  covered  with  forest.  We 
met  hardly  any  travellers  in  a  whole  day's 
ride.  So  far  as  we  could  judge  from  our 
conversations  with  Virginians  on  our  whole 
journey  from  Winchester  to  Danville,  that 
is  from  Northern  to  Southern  Virginia, 
opinions  as  to  the  desirableness  of  main 
taining  slavery  were  divided.  Not  a  few 
were  convinced  that  it  was  of  no  advantage 
to  their  State.  But  no  one  could  make  the 
journey  we  did  without  being  impressed 
with  the  great  natural  resources  of  the 
State,  with  the  attractiveness  of  the  scenery 
on  both  sides  of  the  Blue  Ridge,  and  with 
the  shrewdness,  intelligence,  and  activity 
of  the  inhabitants  of  the  Shenandoah 
Valley. 

Passing  from  Danville  into  North  Caro 
lina,  we  travelled  on  a  level  ridge  for  twenty- 
seven  miles  without  crossing  a  stream.  We 
came  also  on  the  first  camp  we  had  seen  of 
a  slave  trader,  buying  up  negroes  to  take  to 
the  gulf  states.  That  was  a  prosperous 
business  both  in  Virginia  and  in  the  Caro- 
linas.  Some  of  the  table  arrangements  in 
Danville  and  in  towns  further  south  were 
novel.  Beef  steak  was  served  in  a  large, 
deep  potato  dish,  from  which  you  drew  your 
rations  with  a  spoon.  Butter,  a  most 
liberal  supply,  from  one  to  three  pounds, 
[52] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

was  placed  in  slices  on  the  largest  plate  on 
the  table.  Sometimes  this  plate  was  placed 
on  an  inverted  bowl,  sometimes  on  a  cir 
cular  board  twelve  or  fifteen  inches  in  di 
ameter,  which  was  supported  on  a  wooden 
standard  a  foot  high. 

Our  journey  to  Greensboro,  North  Caro 
lina  (named  after  General  Green  of  revolu 
tionary  fame),  took  us  over  the  battlefield 
of  Guilford  Court  House,  and  over  the  region 
in  which  Cornwallis  and  Green  contended 
for  some  time.  A  venerable  man,  said  to  be 
the  oldest  in  Martinsville,  assured  us  that 
Washington  fought  the  battle  with  Corn 
wallis  and  won  it.  He  modestly  added  that 
he  remembered  nothing  more  about  it. 

Near  Greensboro  we  visited  the  Hodgins 
Gold  Mine,  which  was  then  worked  with 
profit,  but  like  the  other  North  Carolina 
gold  mines  was  afterwards  abandoned. 
The  gold  was  found  chiefly  in  the  earthy 
matter  which  surrounded  the  loose  quartz. 
Copper  was  also  found.  We  also  went  to 
see  the  mines  of  Gold  Hill  where  they  were 
taking  out  four  hundred  dollars  worth  of 
gold  daily. 

We  passed  through  Salisbury  to  Char 
lotte.  There  was  here  a  branch  mint, 
where  they  made  no  coins  larger  than  five 
dollar  pieces.  They  employed  only  four 
[53] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

men  in  their  work.  We  crossed  the  State 
line  into  South  Carolina,  and  traversed 
Lancaster  County,  passing  over  the  scene 
of  Sumter's  and  of  Gates'  military  opera 
tions  in  the  Revolution.  The  soil  was  light 
and  sandy.  Lofty  pines  were  here  first  en 
countered.  In  this  region  we  met  the  first 
advocates  of  secession.  Some  of  them 
warned  us  that  it  would  be  dangerous  for 
us  to  approach  Columbia.  We  replied  that 
we  would  continue  our  journey  until  we 
saw  signs  of  danger. 

Camden  we  found  an  attractive  town  of 
between  two  and  three  thousand  inhabi 
tants.  De  Kalb's  remains  lie  beneath  a 
monument  in  the  Presbyterian  church. 
His  name  was  given  to  a  cotton  factory 
which  we  visited.  Near  it  was  the  figure 
of  an  iron  man  on  which  Colonel  Dickinson, 
killed  in  the  Mexican  War,  had  practiced 
with  his  pistol  in  preparation  for  a  duel. 
We  were  told  that  a  duel  had  been  fought 
in  the  town  a  year  before  our  visit,  and  an 
other  two  years  before.  Public  opinion 
seemed  to  approve  of  duelling.  Camden 
was  Cornwallis'  headquarters  at  one  period 
in  his  southern  campaign.  The  Camden 
Journal  was  a  violent  secession  sheet. 

On  the  road  from  Camden  to  Columbia 
we  passed  large  fields  of  cotton,  one  a  mile 
[54] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

long.  As  the  Legislature  was  in  session 
we  found  it  impossible  to  gain  admission  to 
any  hotel,  but  after  a  long  search  in  the 
evening  were  received  at  a  boarding  house. 
The  next  day  being  Sunday,  we  had  the 
good  fortune  to  hear  Rev.  Dr.  Thornwell, 
one  of  the  most  distinguished  preachers  in 
the  South,  deliver  the  baccalaureate  sermon 
to  the  graduating  class  of  the  University 
of  South  Carolina.  It  was  a  discourse  of 
great  power. 

On  the  next  day  we  attended  the 
Commencement  exercises.  The  Governor 
(Scab rook),  the  President  of  the  Senate,  the 
Speaker  of  the  House,  and  a  group  of  promi 
nent  citizens  occupied  the  stage.  We  were 
rather  surprised  to  see  a  supply  of  cus 
pidors  on  the  stage  for  tobacco  chewers,  and 
they  were  by  no  means  superfluous  fur 
niture.  We  thought  the  students'  speeches 
were  only  moderately  good.  The  Presi 
dent's  address  to  them  was  solely  an  appeal 
to  them  to  abide  by  the  State  in  the  disso 
lution  of  the  Union  which  he  regarded  as 
inevitable.  He  exhorted  them  to  fight  and 
conquer  or  fall  beneath  the  Palmetto  banner. 
Several  of  the  students'  speeches  referred  to 
the  secession  of  the  States  as  certain  to  come. 

On  the  following  day  we  visited  the  Leg 
islature.  The  halls  were  hung  in  mourn- 
[55] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

ing  for  Calhoun.  During  this  session  the 
speeches  abounded  with  allusions  to  the 
coming  dissolution  of  the  Union.  In  the 
evening  we  took  tea  with  Mrs.  McCord,  a 
most  gifted  and  learned  woman,  the  daugh 
ter  of  that  eminent  statesman,  Langdon 
Cheves.  Though  extremely  cordial  to  us 
personally,  she  expressed  what  seemed  to  be 
the  general  feeling  in  Columbia  when  she 
said  to  us,  "We  ought  to  fight  you  of  the 
North."  It  will  be  remembered  that  this 
was  nearly  nine  years  before  the  attack  on 
Fort  Sumter. 

From  Columbia  we  set  out  for  Augusta, 
Georgia.  At  the  end  of  the  second  day's 
journey  we  halted  before  a  house  and  in 
quired  for  Lees  town,  which  appeared  on  the 
map.  No  other  house  was  visible.  "This 
is  Leestown,"  responded  a  man,  who  proved 
to  be  Mr.  Lee.  He  informed  us  —  we  had 
not  failed  to  observe  it  —  that  the  land  in 
that  neighbourhood  produced  little  or  noth 
ing.  The  country  we  had  passed  through 
was  of  course  very  sparsely  settled.  We 
lodged  at  Mr.  Lee's.  As  we  entered  Ham 
burg,  opposite  Augusta,  we  saw  twenty 
negroes  marching  round  a  piazza  singing 
merrily.  They  were  for  sale.  Not  even 
this  fact  depressed  their  spirits. 

We  found  Augusta  the  most  attractive 
[56] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

southern  city  we  had  seen.  It  had  about 
twelve  thousand  inhabitants.  The  two 
principal  streets  were  lined  with  fine  dwell 
ings.  One  of  them,  a  mile  or  more  in 
length,  had  two  rows  of  trees  in  the  middle, 
and  one  row  on  each  side.  There  were  two 
large  cotton  mills  under  the  charge  of  a 
man  brought  from  Lowell,  Massachusetts. 
They  were  as  well  equipped  as  any  we  had 
seen  at  home.  The  operatives  were  all 
white.  We  made  a  vain  attempt  to  sell 
our  horses,  as  we  learned  that  owing  to  the 
sparseness  of  the  population  in  southwestern 
Georgia  we  should  find  it  very  uncomfort 
able  travelling  on  horseback  to  middle 
Florida,  where  we  had  decided  to  go  for  the 
remainder  of  the  winter.  We  left  the 
horses  in  Augusta,  while  we  went  by  rail 
to  Charleston,  South  Carolina. 

We  had  to  leave  at  five  A.M.,  without 
breakfast.  We  stopped  for  breakfast  near 
Aiken.  Mr.  Hazard  paid  for  our  meals. 
As  we  were  sitting  by  the  fire  near  a  Vir 
ginian,  the  whistle  blew  and  we  three  started 
for  the  train.  A  negro  waiter  came  run 
ning  after  us,  exclaiming,  "Didn't  one  of 
you  gemmens  forgit  to  pay  for  breakfast?" 
Mr.  Hazard  replied,  "We  paid."  The  Vir 
ginian,  looking  the  negro  fiercely  in  the 
eye,  said  sharply,  "Which  is  it?  Point 
[57] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

him  out."  "I  d'n  know,"  said  the  negro. 
"Point  him  out,"  repeated  the  Virginian. 
By  this  time  the  cars  were  moving  and  we 
all  jumped  in.  "That  is  my  fix,"  coolly 
remarked  the  Virginian  to  us. 

Till  we  were  within  four  miles  of  Charles 
ton,  we  were  passing  through  a  succession 
of  cypress  swamps  and  pine  barrens.  We 
spent  a  few  days  in  Charleston  most  agree 
ably.  Our  classmate,  Mendenhall,  and 
friends  to  whom  we  had  letters,  received  us 
with  the  hospitality  characteristic  of  that 
city.  The  houses  were  generally  built  in 
the  Grecian  style  of  architecture,  with 
broad  piazzas  on  three  sides.  Magnolias 
and  live  oaks  abounded  in  the  open  spaces. 
We  made  an  excursion  up  Cooper's  River 
to  see  the  rice  fields,  and  to  Sullivan's 
Island,  which  was  then  a  summer  resort 
for  the  Charlestonians.  We  obtained  our 
trunks  which  we  had  sent  by  sea  from 
Baltimore.  Mr.  Hazard  had  been  robbed 
of  a  part  of  his  wardrobe;  but  we  were 
enabled  to  lay  aside  our  suits  of  Vermont 
gray  and  dress  in  proper  form  to  receive 
the  hospitalities  of  our  friends. 

Mr.  and  Mrs.  McCord  having  invited  us 

when  we  were  at  Columbia  to  spend  the 

Christmas    holidays    with    them    on    their 

plantation  at  Fort  Motte,  some  thirty  miles 

[58] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

south  of  Columbia,  we  gladly  availed  our 
selves  of  the  opportunity  to  see  something 
of  plantation  life  under  so  auspicious  cir 
cumstances.  On  December  nineteenth  we 
went  by  rail  from  Charleston.  We  were 
most  cordially  received  by  our  host  and 
hostess  who  were  living  in  a  fine  mansion 
surrounded  by  grounds  laid  out  in  excellent 
taste. 

We  walked  out  with  Mr.  McCord  to  the 
negro  quarters.  He  had  one  hundred  and 
thirty-seven  negroes,  and  was  building  new 
and  comfortable  tenements  for  them.  He 
had  a  house  in  which  all  the  negro  children 
were  kept  during  the  day  in  charge  of  at 
tendants,  and  a  hospital  provided  with 
nurses.  Every  negro  had  his  particular 
task  and  drew  his  ration  of  food.  The 
arrangements  were  very  systematical.  The 
children  sang  hymns  for  us  and  all  of  them 
down  to  the  veriest  tot  sang  con  amore,  as 
legs,  arms,  and  bodies  were  all  called  into 
requisition.  The  plantation  called  "Lang 
Syne"  had  about  three  thousand  acres  and 
produced  from  one  hundred  and  eighty  to 
two  hundred  bales  of  cotton.  We  were 
hospitably  entertained  by  dinner  parties 
and  hunting  parties  on  the  plantations  in 
the  neighbourhood.  Partridges,  rabbits, 
and  squirrels  were  the  game  sought.  The 
[59] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

negroes  running  and  shouting  rivalled  the 
dogs  in  securing  the  game  shot. 

Our  visit  corrected  our  impression  that 
the  life  of  the  planter  and  his  wife  was  one 
free  from  care.  They  did  have  more  leisure 
than  the  northern  farmer.  But  careful 
management  was  required  to  secure  good 
profits.  And  the  negroes,  careless  about 
their  health,  called  for  much  attention. 
Our  hostess,  during  our  visit,  was  up  all 
night  caring  for  a  sick  negro  baby.  She 
had  made  a  careful  study  of  political 
economy  and  had  translated  a  valuable 
French  work  on  that  subject.  She  had 
given  much  attention  to  the  economics  of 
plantation  life.  She  told  us  that  she  would 
prefer  to  have  $25,000  in  good  bank  stock 
rather  than  $100,000  in  negroes  and  plan 
tations.  The  negroes  of  "Lang  Syne" 
seemed  cheerful  and  merry,  especially  when 
they  came  on  Christmas  day  to  the  house 
to  draw  their  extra  Christmas  rations.  But 
we  were  much  impressed  by  an  incident 
which  occurred  while,  on  our  departure,  we 
were  on  the  way  to  the  railway  station. 
The  negro  driver  was  a  grave  elderly  man, 
a  Baptist  preacher,  in  fact,  for  his  people.  I 
ventured  to  say  to  him,  "You  servants  must 
all  be  very  happy  in  your  lot  with  such  a 
kind  master  and  mistress."  He  answered 
[60] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

not  a  word,  but  looked  at  me  with  a  sur 
prised  and  pathetic  air,  which  seemed  to 
me  to  say,  "You,  who  are  from  the  North, 
ought  to  know  that  slavery  is  not  a  happy 
condition."  I  dropped  the  conversation, 
but  I  have  never  forgotten  the  expression 
of  his  countenance. 

While  waiting  for  a  delayed  train  at  the 
station,  we  met  a  hotel  keeper  from  Quincy, 
Florida,  whose  commendations  of  his  town 
decided  us  to  go  there  for  the  winter.  Mr. 
Hazard  stopped  at  Aiken,  where  we  were 
to  remain  a  few  days,  and  I  went  on  to 
Augusta  to  bring  the  horses  down.  The 
people  at  the  hotel  hardly  recognized  me,  as 
I  no  longer  wore  the  riding  costume  in 
which  they  had  seen  me.  The  horses  hav 
ing  been  in  the  stable  three  weeks  I  had 
a  lively  time,  riding  one  and  leading  the 
other.  It  rained  heavily  all  day.  I  ar 
rived  at  Aiken  soaked  to  the  skin.  The 
next  day  as  Mr.  Hazard  and  I  were  taking  a 
ride,  his  horse  ran  away  and  he  was  thrown 
heavily  against  a  tree,  but  fortunately  my 
fear  that  he  was  seriously  hurt  proved  to 
be  unfounded.  We  sold  the  horses  and 
saddles  and  bridles  for  a  little  more  than 
they  cost  us.  We  remained  a  week  in 
Aiken.  It  rained  almost  every  day,  and 
once  we  had  snow  three  or  four  inches  deep 
[61] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

at  which  some  of  the  negro  children  were 
much  excited,  as  they  had  never  before 
seen  it. 

On  January  6,  1851,  we  set  out  from 
Aiken  for  Florida.  We  sat  up,  as  there 
were  no  sleeping  cars  on  the  trains  in  those 
days,  all  night  on  the  journey  from  Augusta 
to  Atlanta.  This  place  was  just  getting 
started  as  the  junction  point  of  three  rail 
roads.  We  went  on  at  once  to  Macon,  the 
farthest  point  on  our  route  which  we  could 
then  reach  by  rail.  At  10.30  P.M.  we 
started  from  there  in  a  small  coach.  Why 
I  know  not,  but  all  through  the  South  the 
coaches  which  we  took  generally  started  in 
the  night,  some  of  them  at  2  A.M.  We 
had  hardly  left  the  town  when  the  coach 
was  upset,  and  unluckily  the  only  door  was 
on  the  side  next  to  the  ground.  We  broke 
the  window  on  the  other  side  and  crawled 
out  into  the  mud.  I  took  the  driver's  lan 
tern  and  walked  ahead,  while  Mr.  Hazard 
held  up  the  coach  to  keep  it  from  capsizing 
again.  After  awhile  we  remounted,  but 
had  not  gone  far  before  the  coach  fell 
plump  into  a  mud  hole  so  as  to  pitch  off  a 
clergyman  from  the  driver's  seat  and  to 
pitch  the  driver  off  headlong  after  him.  It 
proved  we  were  near  a  camp  of  negro 
teamsters  who  had  a  lightwood  fire  and 
[62] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

some  loads  of  furniture.  We  cut  down 
chairs  and  sat  by  the  fire  and  waited  un 
til  nearly  daylight,  when  a  larger  and  bet 
ter  coach  came  to  our  relief.  Frequently, 
during  the  journey  the  mud  was  so  deep 
that  we  had  to  alight  and  walk  in  the 
night  as  well  as  in  the  daytime  to  enable 
the  horses  to  draw  the  empty  vehicle.  As 

1  sat  with  the  driver,  he  pointed  out  to  me 
the  sloughs  in  which  the  coach  had  been 
upset  on  previous  trips.     The  food  at  the 
inns  was  as  bad  as  could  be. 

One  day  we  had  a  long  fast  because  we 
reached  no  inn.  The  country  was  very 
sparsely  settled.  The  roads  were  indescrib 
ably  bad;  swamps,  corduroys,  roots  of  trees, 
gullies,  mud  holes,  creeks  to  be  forded,  were 
our  obstacles.  Three  nights  we  travelled 
in  these  conditions,  much  of  the  time  in 
heavy  rain,  and  finally  reached  Quincy  at 

2  A.M.,  after  the  most  fatiguing  and  un 
comfortable  journey   we   had   ever   taken. 
This  was  Friday  morning  and  we  had  not 
been  in  bed  since  Sunday  night.     South 
western  Georgia,   as  we  saw  it,  was   not 
very  inviting. 

As  we  were  taking  a  late  breakfast  in  the 
hotel,  the  morning  of  our  arrival,  we  wit 
nessed   a   scene   which   was   disturbing   to 
northern   young   men.     The   negro   waiter 
[63] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

whom  we  had  sent  to  the  kitchen  to  fill  our 
order,  in  crossing  the  back  yard,  fell  into  a 
fight  with  another  negro.  In  the  midst  of 
the  tumult  a  white  man  appeared  with  a 
raw  hide  and  began  to  lay  it  on  the  back 
of  our  waiter  with  great  force.  The  boy  in 
his  pain  ran  and  struck  his  head  repeatedly 
against  the  brick  wall  as  if  to  dash  out  his 
brains.  But  the  white  man  continued  his 
blows  until  the  negro  fell  to  the  ground. 
We  were  told  that  the  white  man  was  his 
owner  and  was  a  citizen  of  New  Jersey,  of 
a  family  so  distinguished  that  if  I  should 
mention  his  name  most  readers  of  these 
lines  would  recall  it  as  familiar.  It  is  need 
less  to  say  that  we  did  not  care  for  any 
more  breakfast. 

We  walked  out  soon  after  to  the  front  of 
the  courthouse,  where  a  crowd  was  gath 
ered.  We  found  they  were  selling  at  auc 
tion  the  slaves  of  a  citizen  who  had  recently 
died.  The  negro  families  that  were  to  be 
separated  were  evincing  much  feeling.  A 
fine  looking  girl,  about  eighteen  years  old, 
was  mounting  the  block  as  we  arrived. 
The  auctioneer  rudely  proceeded  to  speak 
of  her  good  points,  as  he  might  of  those  of  a 
horse.  He  made  her  show  her  teeth,  coarse 
men  came  to  feel  of  her  ankles  and  the 
calves  of  her  legs,  to  test  the  quality  of  her 
[64] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

muscles.  It  was  the  most  repulsive  and 
disgusting  spectacle  we  had  ever  seen.  We 
felt  that  this  scene  and  that  at  the  hotel 
were  showing  us  a  side  of  slavery  that  we 
had  learned  nothing  of  in  the  hospitable 
homes  of  South  Carolina.  Near  the  town 
there  were  constantly  camps  of  negroes, 
whom  slave  dealers  had  brought  from  the 
northern  slave  states. 

We  spent  three  months  in  Quincy.  A 
considerable  company  of  invalids  were  win 
tering  there.  As  we  met  each  morning  at 
the  post-office,  their  habitual  conversation 
concerning  their  coughs  and  expectorations 
and  other  tuberculous  symptoms,  were  not 
very  exhilarating,  though  fortunately  we 
were  not  ill  enough  to  be  much  disturbed 
by  them.  We  were  very  hospitably  re 
ceived  by  the  citizens,  many  of  whom  were 
persons  of  intelligence  and  excellent  char 
acter.  That  part  of  Florida  had  been 
mainly  settled  from  the  Carolinas.  Not  a 
few  of  the  men,  after  unsuccessful  business 
ventures  elsewhere,  had  come  there  to 
make  a  fresh  start  in  life,  and  were  as  de 
voted  to  money-getting  as  they  supposed 
the  Yankees  to  be.  Land  was  cheap  and 
well  adapted  to  the  growth  of  cotton,  which 
was  the  chief  crop.  As  no  railways  had 
reached  that  section,  marketing  the  cotton 
[65] 

6 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

was  difficult  and  costly.  It  was  sent  for 
shipment  to  St.  Marks.  There  were  in  the 
neighbourhood  an  undesirable  number  of 
men  who  had  fled  from  creditors  with  no 
intention  of  paying  their  debts  and  of  men 
who  had  committed  crimes  in  their  old 
homes.  Among  this  rougher  element, 
drunkenness  and  violence  were  not  uncom 
mon.  The  rooms  we  rented  were  over  a 
surgeon's  office.  It  was  a  rare  week  when 
some  one  who  had  been  wounded  in  a  fray 
did  not  require  the  surgeon's  attention.  On 
the  other  hand  the  town  was  an  educational 
centre  for  Middle  Florida.  There  was  an 
excellent  boarding  school  for  girls,  kept  by 
two  cultivated  women  from  Connecticut. 
There  was  also  a  boarding  school  for  boys. 
The  churches  had  one  undesirable  feature 
in  their  construction.  They  had  no  under 
pinning,  but  rested  on  posts  three  or  four 
feet  high.  Unhappily  the  swine  which 
were  allowed  to  run  in  the  streets  made 
their  lounging  place  under  the  churches. 
The  rain  flowed  into  the  excavation  they 
made,  and  in  these  pools  fleas  were  bred 
in  profusion.  Unhappily  also  the  floors 
of  some  of  the  churches  were  so  loosely 
laid  that  the  fleas  often  made  their  way 
up  through  the  cracks,  and  climbing  up 
under  the  garments  of  the  worshippers 
[66] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

greatly  interfered  with  a  reverential  enjoy 
ment  of  the  services. 

We  thought  that  there  and  generally  in 
the  South  a  larger  proportion  of  the  people 
attended  church  than  in  the  North.  I  have 
been  struck  with  the  fact  that  Southern  po 
litical  orators  indulge  much  more  than 
Northern  speakers  in  scriptural  allusions 
and  quotations.  Is  it  because  the  South 
erners  are  more  familiar  with  the  Bible 
than  the  Northerners?  I  will  mention  one 
incident  which  may  show  that  some  of  the 
southern  children  are  as  unfamiliar  with  it 
as  the  Northern  children,  whose  unfamiliar- 
ity  with  it  is  so  often  commented  on  in  our 
days.  Finding  that  the  daughter  of  our 
boarding-house  keeper  and  some  of  her 
companions,  girls  of  fourteen  or  fifteen 
years  of  age,  were  not  much  interested  in 
the  Biblical  narratives,  I  imitated  a  device, 
which  I  had  somewhere  read  about,  that 
Franklin  tried  with  a  company  of  French 
infidels  with  success.  Having  promised  to 
tell  them  an  Oriental  story  which  I  thought 
would  interest  them,  I  narrated  in  my  own 
language  the  story  of  Esther.  Not  one  of 
them,  it  proved,  had  read  it.  When  they 
expressed  their  delight  with  it,  I  told  them 
where  they  would  find  it  told  in  a  more  much 
touching  manner. 

[67] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

I  must  repeat  one  incident  illustrating 
how  one's  native  place  is  to  him  the  centre 
of  the  world.  A  rather  dull,  overgrown  boy 
of  fifteen  once  asked  me  where  we  came 
from.  I  replied  "from  Rhode  Island." 
"How  far  away  is  that?"  he  asked.  "About 
thirteen  hundred  miles,"  said  I.  "  Golly,"  he 
rejoined,  "I  don't  see  how  you  stand  it  to  live 
so  fur  off."  In  fact  the  knowledge  of  the 
life  and  industries  and  ideas  of  the  North 
among  even  the  more  intelligent  was  natur 
ally  very  limited.  But  they  were  charitable 
enough  to  me  to  urge  me  very  strongly  to 
remain  in  Quincy  and  teach. 

In  March  we  made  an  excursion  to 
Tallahassee  and  St.  Marks.  The  road  to 
the  capitol  lay  through  forests  and  swamps. 
At  one  point  near  Ocklocknee  Channel, 
posts  were  set  up  to  guide  the  stage  driver 
in  swimming  his  horses  where  water  over 
flowed  the  road.  Tallahassee  was  made 
attractive  by  its  beautiful  gardens.  On 
coming  south  we  were  impressed  by  the  fact 
that  the  farther  south  we  came  the  more 
intensely  Calvinistic  and  severe  was  the 
theology  which  inspired  the  preaching.  In 
Tallahassee  we  heard  by  far  the  sternest  and 
most  sulphurous  discourse  we  listened  to. 

A  dilapidated  railway,  on  which  a  car 
was  drawn  by  horses,  connected  the  city 
[68] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

with  Newport.  The  one  public  building  in 
this  new  town  was  used  for  a  church,  an 
academy,  a  masonic  lodge,  a  courthouse, 
and  a  jail.  From  Newport  we  walked  three 
miles  to  St.  Mark's,  the  old  seaport  for  this 
region.  One  warehouse  and  half-a-dozen 
dilapidated,  weather-beaten  houses  com 
posed  the  town.  The  remains  of  the  old 
Spanish  fort  showed  still  a  part  of  the  wall 
and  parapets  and  moat.  General  Jackson 
seized  it  in  1818.  Creepers  and  peach  trees 
were  growing  from  its  sides.  We  sailed 
down  to  the  lighthouse,  eight  miles,  passing 
Port  Leon  on  the  way,  and  gained  our  first 
view  of  the  blue  waters  of  the  Gulf  of 
Mexico.  Here,  too,  we  first  saw  cormo 
rants  and  alligators.  When  returning  by 
the  railway  we  found  that  fire  in  the 
forests  had  set  the  track  on  fire  at  several 
points;  but  the  driver  put  whip  to  his 
horses  and  carried  our  street  car  safely 
through  the  fire. 

The  next  day  we  drove  sixteen  miles  to 
see  the  Wakulla  Spring.  We  passed  a  few 
cabins  on  the  road,  tenanted  by  sallow, 
wretched-looking  people.  This  spring,  of 
which  the  Indian  name  Wakulla  is  said  to 
mean  "Mystery,"  breaks  out  of  a  sub 
merged  limestone  cliff,  one  hundred  and 
ninety  feet  down  and  forms  a  pool  one  hun- 
[69] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

dred  feet  wide.  The  water  is  so  clear  that 
one  can  see  a  button  dropped  to  the  bottom. 
At  certain  angles  one  sees  beautiful  pris 
matic  hues.  The  shadow  of  your  boat  is 
plainly  perceptible  on  the  bottom.  You 
seem  to  be  floating  in  the  air.  Near  by 
were  some  of  the  bones  of  a  mastodon  which 
had  been  taken  from  the  spring.  The  re 
mainder  of  the  skeleton  had  been  sent  to 
Barnum's  Museum. 

On  April  2  we  bade  adieu  to  our  good 
friends  of  Quincy,  not  one  of  whom  have  I 
ever  seen  since.  We  drove  to  Chatta- 
hoochee  over  a  dreadful  road,  and  in  the 
evening  took  the  steamer  Palmetto  for 
Columbus,  where  we  arrived  the  next  day 
at  1  P.M.  The  river  with  its  precipitous 
banks  largely  covered  with  cypresses  was  of 
more  interest  than  we  had  expected.  Co 
lumbus  was  a  prosperous  city  of  six  thousand 
inhabitants.  Several  cotton  mills  were  in 
process  of  construction. 

The  next  morning  at  2  A.M.,  the  usual 
hour  in  the  South  for  stages  to  start,  we 
set  out  for  Opelika.  Hardly  had  we  seated 
ourselves  when  one  of  the  two  women  pas 
sengers  said  to  the  other,  "Wall,  Poll,  I 
s'pose  we  might  as  well  begin  to  rub  snuff. 
You  got  your  bottle."  Poll  produced  it  and 
they  began  this  disgusting  habit  of  rubbing 
[70] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

a  little  wooden  swab  dipped  in  snuff  in 
their  mouths.  The  odor  of  the  smoke  of 
the  lamps  and  a  fresh  wind  furnished  us 
some  relief.  I  may  as  well  say  in  this  con 
nection  that  in  Florida  the  young  women 
of  good  breeding  were  often  addicted  to 
this  habit,  though  in  private.  On  this 
journey  we  met  with  a  remarkable  negro. 
He  had  purchased  his  freedom.  He  was  on 
his  way  to  release  from  arrest  for  drunken 
ness  his  former  owner  to  whom  he  had  fre 
quently  shown  this  kindness.  He  was  the 
builder  of  a  very  long  bridge  which  we 
crossed.  We  were  told  that  when  the 
builders  of  the  capitol  at  Montgomery 
were  puzzled  in  framing  the  dome,  he  was 
called  in  to  extricate  them  from  their 
trouble. 

From  Opelika  we  went  seventy  miles  by 
rail  to  Montgomery.  The  view  from  the 
Capitol  to  the  north  extended  over  an  in 
terminable  forest,  clothed  in  the  delicate 
green  of  early  spring.  The  city  lies  in  a 
semi-circle  of  hills,  and  appeared  to  be 
fairly  prosperous.  As  we  were  passing 
some  negroes,  one  asked,  "How's  de  peoples 
up  de  country?"  "Oh,  dey's  all  extant," 
replied  another.  We  gathered  from  con 
versation  that  the  sentiment  in  Montgom 
ery  and  the  adjacent  country  was  by  no 
[71] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

means  unanimous  for  secession,  though  the 
subject  was  under  discussion. 

We  proceeded  by  steamer  to  Mobile,  a 
sail  of  a  day  and  a  half,  through  rather  tame 
and  monotonous  scenery.  As  we  passed 
the  steamboats  at  the  wharves  in  Mobile, 
one  of  our  negro  men  would  lead  off  in  a 
song  and  the  negroes  on  the  other  boats 
would  join  in  a  chorus.  This  made  an 
animated  scene  of  our  arrival.  We  spent 
a  happy  day  with  some  good  friends,  but 
were  obliged  to  hurry  on  to  New  Orleans. 
The  business,  mainly  in  cotton,  of  Mobile 
had  been  declining,  but  they  hoped  that 
the  completion  of  the  Mobile  &  Ohio 
Railroad  would  revive  it.  The  harbour 
was  so  shallow  that  much  of  the  cotton  for 
export  had  to  be  carried  thirty  miles  in 
lighters. 

We  went  by  steamer  to  New  Orleans. 
At  that  time,  steamers  and  sailing  ships, 
foreign  and  American,  crowded  the  levee 
for  miles.  The  products  of  the  Mississippi 
Valley  lay  piled  in  confusion  as  far  as  the 
eye  could  see.  Thousands  of  negroes  were 
busy  loading  drays  and  ships,  singing  as 
they  toiled.  No  other  such  scene  could  be 
witnessed  in  America.  The  visit  to  the 
foreign  quarters,  the  mingling  of  French  and 
Spanish  with  the  English,  the  cemeteries 
[72] 


JAMESB.     ANGELL 

with  their  peculiar  tombs,  the  thousand 
sights  which  characterize  a  European  city, 
were  all  strange  and  fascinating  to  us. 
Visiting  the  steamer  Peytona  to  bid  fare 
well  to  some  friends,  we  had  our  first  and 
only  view  of  Henry  Clay  who  was  depart 
ing  for  home  on  that  boat.  As  was  the 
custom,  a  concourse  of  ladies  were  kissing 
him  good-bye.  That  proved,  I  think,  to  be 
his  last  visit  to  New  Orleans.  We  dined 
with  Jacob  Barker,  the  most  distinguished 
merchant  in  the  city,  who  once  won  a 
famous  law-suit,  which  turned  on  the  con 
tention  raised  by  him  that  a  whale  is  not  a 
fish  but  a  mammal. 

On  ascending  the  river  we  passed  two  or 
three  large  crevasses  through  which  the 
water,  pouring  like  a  river,  had  flooded  the 
country  as  far  as  we  could  see,  and  to  the 
depth  of  several  feet.  The  people  had  fled 
from  their  houses  in  boats.  We  stopped  at 
Baton  Rouge  long  enough  to  visit  the  capi- 
tol,  not  quite  completed,  and  the  state 
prison,  whose  inmates  were  employed  in  a 
cotton  mill  established  within  the  walls. 
We  continued  on  the  steamer  we  took  at 
Baton  Rouge  until  we  reached  Paducah. 
There  we  heard  a  Judge  charging  the  jury 
in  a  very  original  manner.  He  always  re 
ferred  to  the  Court  as  "She,"  and  inveighed 
[73] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

against  demagogues  "  honey f ogling  the 
people." 

We  went  by  steamer  to  Nashville.  We 
found  the  views  of  the  bluffs  on  the  river  in 
refreshing  contrast  to  the  low,  level,  and 
monotonous  banks  of  the  Mississippi.  The 
city  has  a  fine  site  in  the  hills  overlooking 
the  Cumberland  River.  State  prisoners 
were  erecting  the  Capitol.  They  had  been 
at  work  on  it  six  years,  and  it  was  supposed 
that  three  years  more  would  be  required  to 
complete  it. 

From  Nashville  we  went  by  stage  coach 
to  the  Mammoth  Cave.  We  spent  two 
days  in  exploring  that  most  famous  of  all 
caves.  A  tedious  stage  coach  journey  took 
us  from  the  Cave  to  Louisville.  After  a 
brief  visit  with  friends,  one  of  them  our 
college  classmate,  Reuben  T.  Durrett,  since 
well  known  as  a  scholar,  learned  in  the  his 
tory  of  Kentucky,  we  took  the  steamer  for 
Cincinnati. 

We  spent  Sunday  in  that  city.  By 
chance  we  went  to  the  church  of  which  Dr. 
Willis  Lord,  once  pastor  of  my  own  church 
in  Providence,  was  the  pastor  and  heard 
an  excellent  sermon  from  him.  On  climb 
ing  the  hill  back  of  the  city,  we  gained  a 
view  of  Professor  Mitchell's  Observatory, 
of  which  years  afterwards  I  heard  him 
[74] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

speak  so  frequently.  He  used  to  relate 
with  pride,  that  in  a  hundred  days  from  his 
departure  for  Europe  he  returned  with  his 
telescope.  Few  astronomers  could  tell  in  so 
eloquent  language  as  he  did  of  the  revela 
tions  made  to  him  by  his  instrument. 

We  left  Cincinnati  by  coach  at  4  o'clock 
A.M.  for  Dublin,  Indiana,  to  visit  the  Van- 
uxems,  Quaker  relatives  of  Mr.  Hazard. 
This  drive  took  us  through  a  most  fertile 
country,  inhabited  by  an  industrious  and 
thrifty  people.  When  I  saw  a  white  man 
actually  sawing  his  own  wood,  I  felt  like 
going  to  shake  hands  with  him.  We  had 
come  to  a  land  where  honest  physical  toil 
was  honourable.  The  beautiful  beech  and 
maple  groves  of  eastern  Indiana,  having  no 
undergrowth,  were  charming  to  our  eyes. 
We  spent  a  week  most  pleasantly  with  the 
simple,  hospitable,  prosperous  people  of 
Dublin  and  Cambridge,  and  returned  to 
Cincinnati  in  a  long  day's  drive  to  take  the 
steamer  for  Pittsburg. 

No  scenery  we  had  beheld  was  so  enchant 
ing  as  that  on  the  voyage  up  the  Ohio. 
We  looked  up  our  friends,  the  Randolphs 
and  Tanners,  and  passed  a  pleasant  day 
with  them.  We  made  the  journey  to 
Johnstown  by  canal  boat,  a  most  agreeable 
mode  of  travelling  through  the  romantic 
[75] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

valleys.  At  Johnstown  we  were  drawn  up 
an  inclined  plane  and  started  by  rail  for 
Philadelphia.  We  called  upon  our  old 
friends.  I  left  Mr.  Hazard  there  and 
reached  home  on  May  22,  after  an  absence 
of  seven  months  and  eighteen  days,  rein- 
vigorated  in  health. 


[76] 


III. 

WORK  IN  CIVIL  ENGINEERING  AND 
STUDY  IN  EUROPE 

THE  trouble  with  my  throat  described  on 
page  40,  really  changed  the  whole  plan  of 
my  life,  as  I  had  then  marked  it  out.  I 
had  formed  the  purpose  of  studying  for  the 
ministry.  Some  of  my  most  intimate  college 
friends  were  already  pursuing  theological 
studies  in  the  Andover  Theological  Semi 
nary,  where  I  used  to  visit  them.  I  had 
formed  the  acquaintance  of  the  eminent 
Professors,  Park,  Edwards,  and  Phelps.  I 
had  even  gone  so  far  as  to  engage  my  room 
for  the  autumn.  But  the  trouble  with  my 
throat  continued  for  weeks  so  obstinate 
that  I  deemed  it  wise  to  consult  a  noted 
Boston  specialist  on  diseases  of  the  throat. 
He  informed  me  that  I  must  not  indulge  in 
the  hope  of  being  able  to  pursue  any  pro 
fession  in  which  I  should  have  to  speak  in 
public.  He  said  it  would  not  be  prudent 
for  me  even  to  attempt  to  teach.  He  ad 
vised  me  to  choose  some  out-door  employ 
ment.  This  announcement  was  a  bitter 
disappointment.  It  seemed  for  a  time  that 
[77] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

every  door  to  a  career  in  which  I  had  any 
interest  was  shut  in  my  face. 

I  asked  myself  what  out-of-door  employ 
ment  is  there  in  which  I  can  profit  by  the 
education  I  have  had.  I  decided  that  civil 
engineering  gave  the  best  promise  of  ful 
filling  that  condition.  Fortunately  some  of 
my  friends  knew  Mr.  E.  S.  Chesboro,  a 
former  resident  of  Providence,  and  then 
City  Engineer  of  Boston.  In  answer  to 
their  inquiries  he  expressed  a  willingness  to 
take  me  into  his  office.  I  reported  to  him 
for  duty  in  August,  1851.  The  work  on 
the  Cochituate  water  supply  in  Boston  was 
not  then  completed,  and  I  was  employed 
mainly  on  that.  In  those  days  few  men  in 
the  engineering  offices  had  received  a  tech 
nical  or  even  a  mathematical  education  in 
the  schools.  They  had  usually  worked 
their  way  up  from  the  position  of  rodman, 
and  they  accomplished  what  they  did  by 
rule-of -thumb  work  or  by  the  mechanical  use 
of  formulae  the  rationale  or  origin  of  which 
they  did  not  know.  It  proved  that  I  was 
the  only  one  in  the  office  from  the  chief 
down  who  had  studied  the  Calculus,  and  as 
a  real  knowledge  of  some  of  the  formulae 
for  water  problems  involved  that  study,  I 
presently  found  them  turned  over  to  me. 
As  one  recalls  how  slender  were  the  op- 
[78] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

portunities  in  those  days  for  training  in 
engineering  studies  and  observes  the  large 
number  of  excellent  engineering  schools  in 
our  country,  one  may  say  that  in  no  branch 
of  education  has  there  been  more  rapid 
and  helpful  development  than  in  that  of 
engineering  in  all  its  applications. 

The  Grand  Trunk  road  from  Montreal  to 
Boston  was  opened  while  I  was  in  the 
office.  I  assisted  in  making  an  immense 
map,  which  was  stretched  in  the  tent  on  the 
Common  when  the  celebration  of  this  event 
was  held.  Lord  Elgin,  the  Governor-gen 
eral  of  Canada,  and  President  Fillmore  were 
present.  I  remember  that  as  Mr.  Fillmore 
was  said  to  be  unaccustomed  to  riding,  I 
saw  two  negroes  holding  his  horse  carefully 
by  the  bits  as  the  animal  slowly  walked  in 
the  procession.  We  all  agreed  that  he  was 
a  very  handsome  man,  but  not  much  of  a 
cavalier. 

At  one  time  complaint  was  made  of  the 
impurity  of  the  Cochituate  water  in  Boston. 
Mr.  Chesboro  invited  me  to  walk  with  him 
through  about  two  miles  of  the  conduit, 
from  which  the  water  had  been  partially 
drawn  off,  somewhere  west  of  Cambridge. 
And  there  on  this  subterranean  excursion  I 
made  the  acquaintance  of  Professor  Hors- 
ford  of  Harvard,  whose  friendship  I  after- 
[79] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

wards  enjoyed  through  his  life.  The  walk 
ing  on  the  bottom  of  an  egg-shaped  conduit 
in  which  about  a  foot  of  water  had  been 
left  was  not  altogether  easy  or  agreeable. 
It  was  decided  that  some  vegetable  deposit 
had  found  its  way  into  the  water. 

One  day  near  the  end  of  November,  Mr. 
Chesboro  assigned  to  me  the  task  of  making 
a  survey  and  a  map  of  Boston  Common, 
showing  every  path  and  every  tree  on  it. 
This  was  to  be  made  at  the  request  of  some 
dweller  on  Beacon  Street,  who  for  many 
years  had  daily  walked  around  the  Com 
mon.  I  began  in  the  corner  just  in  front 
of  the  State  House.  While  I  was  at  work 
I  received  a  letter  from  my  friend  Hazard 
saying  that  he  was  still  having  trouble  with 
his  lungs  and  that  his  father  had  decided 
to  send  him  to  Southern  Europe  for  the 
winter  and  wished  me  to  accompany  him. 
He  begged  me  to  come  to  his  home  immedi 
ately  and  confer  with  him.  I  did  so,  and 
it  was  decided  that  we  should  sail  at  once. 
I  went  back  to  Boston,  and  took  my  leave 
of  Mr.  Chesboro,  to  whose  kindness  I  was 
greatly  indebted.  So  ended  my  work  in 
engineering.  After  a  brief  visit  to  my 
parents,  I  joined  Mr.  Hazard  and  we  sailed 
from  New  York  for  Havre  on  the  steamship 
Arago,  Captain  Lines,  on  December  13. 
[80] 


J*A  M  E  S    B.    A  N  G  E  L  L 

We  had  only  thirteen  passengers.  Among 
them  were  Mr.  Spence  of  Baltimore,  after 
wards  our  Minister  to  Turkey,  George  W. 
Kendall,  editor  of  the  New  Orleans  Pica 
yune,  who  greatly  enlivened  our  voyage  by 
his  wit,  and  one  typical  specimen  of  the 
self-reliant  Connecticut  Yankee.  This  last 
was  on  his  wedding  trip.  His  opportunities 
for  education  had  been  limited.  But  he  was 
daunted  by  no  obstacles  of  travel  in  foreign 
parts.  By  some  means  he  had  persuaded 
himself  that  although  he  knew  no  French, 
he  could  make  a  French  word  out  of  an 
English  word  if  he  pronounced  it  very 
loudly  and  added  the  termination  bus.  So 
he  would  accost  one  of  the  waiters  who  were 
all  French,  thus:  "Gargon,  bring  me  some 
cheese-ibus."  And  in  fact  he  generally  got 
it.  He  travelled  at  such  a  pace  that  by  the 
time  we  reached  Florence  he  had  been  all 
through  the  East  and  was  on  his  way  home. 
We  met  him  in  the  street  in  Florence  one 
morning  with  one-half  of  his  face  covered 
with  lather  and  inquired  of  him  what  had 
happened  to  him.  With  much  vehemence 
he  said:  "I  wanted  to  be  shaved.  I  went 
into  a  shop  which  had  a  barber's  pole  in 
front  and  sat  down.  The  barber  soon  gave 
me  to  understand  that  he  bled  people,  but 
did  not  shave  them.  So  I  went  to  another 
[81] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

shop.  The  barber  there  lathered  my  face 
and  began  to  shave  me  with  a  razor  so  dull 
that  I  snatched  it  from  his  hand  and  told 
him  I  could  make  a  razor  sharper  than  that 
on  the  sole  of  my  boot.  So  here  I  am  look 
ing  for  another  barber."  We  asked  him  how 
he  had  contrived  to  get  all  over  southern  and 
eastern  Europe  so  rapidly  and  writh  no  lan 
guage  but  English.  Holding  his  purse  in 
one  hand  and  his  cane  in  the  other,  he 
replied,  "With  that  purse  in  one  hand  and 
that  cane  in  the  other,  and  with  swearing  a 
little  at  times,  I  can  go  all  over  Europe." 
And  I  have  reason  to  think  he  did. 

We  arrived  at  Havre  on  December  27. 
When  the  pilot  came  aboard  he  astonished 
us  by  the  announcement  that  by  a  coup 
d'etat  Louis  Napoleon  had  taken  full  pos 
session  of  the  government,  that  many  of  the 
prominent  statesmen  were  in  prison,  and 
that  martial  law  was  declared.  On  landing, 
Mr.  Hazard  and  I  proceeded  at  once  to 
Rouen,  where  we  spent  a  day  in  visiting 
the  churches.  We  were  delighted  with  our 
first  view  of  the  florid  Gothic  architecture. 
Thence  we  went  immediately  to  Paris, 
where  we  found  much  excitement  over  the 
coup  d'etat.  The  marks  of  the  bullets  which 
had  been  fired  in  the  conflicts  along  the 
Boulevard  des  Italiens  were  still  fresh. 
[82] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

But  the  places  of  amusement  were  all 
open.  At  the  Theatre  Frangais  we  saw 
that  great  actor  Got  in  Moliere's  Malade 
Imaginaire  and  Rachel  in  Phedre  and  the 
theatre  was  crowded  on  both  nights.  When 
I  was  in  college  we  were,  like  students  in 
most  New  England  colleges,  forbidden  to 
attend  the  theatre  on  pain  of  expulsion. 
Therefore  I  had  never  before  seen  plays 
presented  by  great  actors  and  actresses. 
Although  my  understanding  of  the  lan 
guage  was  imperfect,  these  performances 
were  the  revelation  of  a  new  world  to  me.1 

We  were  assured  that  many  prominent 
men  had  been  thrown  into  prison.  But  so 
far  as  we  could  observe,  business  seemed  to 
be  going  on  everywhere,  and  we  were  not 
interfered  with  at  all. 

There  was  a  notable  service  in  Notre 
Dame  which  we  attended,  in  which  the 
Archbishop  of  Paris  invoked  the  divine 
blessing  on  the  President  in  his  new  under 
taking. 

We  also  attended  a  reception  given  by 

1 1  may  properly  remark  here  that  during  this  visit 
to  Europe,  I  did  not  keep  a  diary,  but  wrote  home  my 
detailed  letters,  which  were  preserved  until  they  were 
burned  when  my  father's  house  was  destroyed  by  fire. 
I  depend  on  my  present  recollections  for  what  I  now  write 
concerning  the  European  journey. 

[83] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

our  Consul,  Mr.  Goodrich,  the  Peter  Parley, 
whose  books  have  been  the  delight  of  our 
childhood.  He  appeared  to  us  to  be  the 
impersonation  of  the  amiable,  entertaining, 
child-loving  Peter  Parley,  of  whom  we  had 
been  so  fond,  and  he  seemed  much  pleased 
at  our  acknowledgment  of  our  great  in 
debtedness  to  his  books. 

The  weather  was  very  damp  and  chilly, 
and  therefore,  a  week  after  our  arrival,  we 
set  out  for  Marseilles  on  our  way  to  Italy. 
Having  engaged  our  seats  in  the  diligence, 
we  went  to  the  office  at  the  appointed  hour 
and  occupied  them.  The  diligence  was 
driven  to  the  railway  station  and  there  the 
body  was  lifted  with  passengers  and  bag 
gage  by  a  crane  and  deposited  on  a  flat 
car.  So  we  were  transported  to  Dijon, 
where  the  diligence  body  was  again  lifted 
by  a  crane  and  placed  on  wheels.  We  were 
then  drawn  by  horses  to  Lyons.  Thence 
we  were  taken  by  rail  to  Marseilles.  On 
our  journey  we  saw  many  citizens  tied  to 
ropes  and  marching  under  military  guard 
to  prison.  Everywhere  there  was  manifest 
a  feeling  of  high  tension. 

A  young  lieutenant  in  uniform  journeyed 
with  us  from  Lyons  to  Marseilles.  On 
arrival  there  a  customs  officer  came  to  ex 
amine  our  baggage.  The  lieutenant  refused 
[84] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

to  allow  the  officer  to  touch  his  port 
manteau.  When  the  officer  insisted,  the 
lieutenant  drew  his  pistol  and  forced  a  re 
treat.  After  the  officer  left,  the  lieutenant 
turned  to  us  with  a  laugh  and  said,  "The 
pistol  was  not  loaded."  Leges  silent  inter 
arma. 

From  Marseilles  we  went  by  diligence  via 
Draguignan  to  Genoa,  and  thence  by  sea  to 
Naples.  We  spent  a  few  days  there,  of 
course  visiting  Pompeii  and  ascending  Ve 
suvius.  We  met  our  old  teacher,  Professor 
Gammell,  who  was  on  his  wedding  trip  with 
his  wife,  the  daughter  of  Robert  H.  Ives. 
He  proposed  to  us  to  join  them  in  the 
journey  to  Rome  in  a  private  carriage.  In 
those  days  of  few  railways  this  was  a  charm 
ing  method  of  travel.  The  vetturino, 
usually  a  Swiss,  furnished  the  carriage  and 
horses,  stopped  wherever  one  wished  on  the 
journey,  paid  all  the  hotel  bills,  and  spared 
one  all  the  trouble  of  bargaining  with  the 
natives.  As  there  was  a  railway  as  far  as 
Capua,  Mr.  Hazard  and  I  went  ahead  to 
visit  that  place  of  so  much  historic  interest. 
We  drove  out  towards  evening  to  the  vil 
lage  near  which  Hannibal  was  said  to  have 
encamped,  and  found  a  most  interesting 
fete  going  on.  The  peasants  in  their  pic 
turesque  costumes  were  dancing  on  the 
[85] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

green.  On  our  return  to  the  hotel  we  were 
told  that  we  were  fortunate  in  escaping 
robbery,  since  that  village  was  the  resort 
at  such  times  of  some  desperate  characters. 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Gammell  joined  us  on  the 
next  day,  and  we  had  a  delightful  three 
days'  journey  to  Rome.  The  approach  to 
the  city  from  that  side  is  far  more  pic 
turesque  than  from  Civitavecchia  or  from 
Florence.  We  spent  six  weeks  in  the  high 
est  enjoyment  I  ever  experienced  in  all  my 
travels.  Fresh  from  our  college  studies, 
with  Horace  in  the  pocket  as  a  guide-book, 
every  step  revealed  to  us  some  object  of  the 
deepest  interest.  At  night  we  returned  to 
our  rooms  to  read  afresh  of  all  we  had  seen. 
Almost  literally  we  could  say  that  we 
travelled  and  observed  all  day  and  then 
studied  all  night.  Such  delights  could 
hardly  come  to  one  later  in  life.  Subse 
quent  visits  to  Rome  never  yielded  a  full 
repetition  of  the  first  experiences.  Rome 
was  also  more  interesting  then  to  the  young 
American  traveller  than  it  is  now  because 
it  was  completely  under  ecclesiastical  con 
trol,  and  the  streets  were  always  gay  with 
processions,  celebrations,  church  festivals 
of  one  kind  and  another.  We  saw  Pius  IX 
(to  whom  the  liberals  everywhere  were  still 
looking  as  friendly  to  their  cause)  on  two 
[86] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

occasions,  a  man  with  so  benignant  a  face 
that  no  one  who  saw  him  could  expect  from 
him  anything  but  benevolence  and  love.  We 
first  saw  him  in  the  Sistine  Chapel  on  Ash 
Wednesday,  when  with  the  impressive  cere 
monial  of  his  church  he  placed  the  ashes 
on  the  heads  of  the  cardinals  and  on  that 
of  the  Duke  of  Norfolk,  the  great  Eng 
lish  Catholic.  I  remember  distinctly  the 
marked  face  of  Cardinal  Antonelli  who  be 
came  the  dominant  adviser  of  the  Pope. 
He  had  brilliant  eyes,  a  swarthy  complexion, 
and  an  expression  that  put  you  on  your 
guard  against  his  strategy.  One  act  in  the 
service  produced  a  comical  effect  on  us  who 
had  never  witnessed  the  ceremonial  before. 
When  the  Cardinals  kneeled  as  a  prayer 
was  offered,  a  page  stepped  behind  each 
and  twisted  the  tail  of  his  gown  into  a  knot, 
exactly  as  we  tie  a  horse's  tail  into  a  knot 
in  muddy  weather. 

One  morning  with  a  large  assembly  we 
stood  in  St.  Peter's,  waiting  for  the  Pope 
to  appear  before  the  high  altar  for  a  great 
ceremonial.  Distinguished  representatives 
from  all  civilized  lands  were  present.  At 
last  the  doors  from  the  Vatican  approach 
swung  open,  the  song  from  the  choir  broke 
upon  the  ear,  and  the  Holy  Father  appeared 
borne  in  a  sort  of  palanquin.  As  the  atten- 
[87] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

tion  of  the  multitude  was  absorbed  by  the 
scene,  a  man  standing  by  my  side  pointed 
to  a  beautiful  Italian  boy  near  us  and  said, 
"It  is  hard,  is  it  not,  to  realize  that  this 
little  body  is  a  temple  greater  than  that  in 
which  we  stand?" 

A  drive  to  Tivoli  and  the  sight  of  the 
"Praeceps  Anio"  gave  us  one  of  our  most 
delightful  days. 

The  visit  to  Rome  brought  to  me  the  first 
real  revelation  of  the  arts  of  sculpture 
and  painting.  The  galleries  and  churches 
opened  to  me  a  new  world.  One  can  not 
describe  what  it  was  to  a  person  who  had 
no  conception  of  art  except  what  he  had 
derived  from  the  sight  of  Powers'  Greek 
Slave  and  copies  in  private  houses  of  two 
or  three  classical  masterpieces  of  painting, 
to  have  suddenly  spread  before  him  the 
immeasurable  artistic  wealth  of  Rome, 
with  full  liberty  to  gaze  upon  it  at  will  and 
to  attain  to  some  worthy  appreciation  of  its 
wealth.  Life  could  never  again  be  quite 
what  it  was  before.  Of  all  the  gifts  of 
Rome  to  me  that  was  the  greatest. 

During  our  stay  in  Rome  the  diligence  on 
the  journey  between  Rome  and  Florence  was 
several  times  stopped  by  highwaymen,  and 
the  passengers  were  robbed  of  their  money, 
watches,  and  jewels.  It  was  said  that  the 
[88] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

robbers  were  for  the  most  part  men  of  good 
families.  Certainly  they  showed  good  breed 
ing.  They  usually  begged  the  passengers 
to  fear  no  bodily  harm.  They  said  that 
they  regretted  extremely  that  the  stress  of 
the  revolutionary  period  had  forced  them  to 
resort  to  this  means  of  gaining  a  livelihood. 
They  politely  helped  the  ladies  to  alight, 
and  after  receiving  their  jewels  and  money 
politely  handed  them  back  to  the  carriage. 

We  four,  who  found  the  travelling  from 
Naples  with  the  vetturino  so  pleasant,  em 
ployed  him  to  take  us  to  Florence.  We 
were  six  days  on  the  journey,  going  by 
Perugia,  and  a  most  agreeable  journey  it 
was.  We  encountered  no  highwaymen. 

Of  course  the  galleries  at  Florence  chiefly 
absorbed  our  attention.  But  the  political 
situation  was  extremely  interesting.  The 
Austrians  were  in  possession  of  Tuscany. 
They  were  intensely  hated  by  the  Italians. 
We  had  rooms  on  the  great  Piazza  del  Gran 
Duca. 

Twice  a  week  Austrian  troops  assembled 
there  and  their  attractive  bands  discoursed 
most  charming  music.  But  as  the  troops 
passed  along  the  streets  the  shutters  were 
closed  and  on  the  Piazza  not  a  Florentine 
could  be  seen.  The  foreigners  and  the  Aus 
trians  had  the  music  to  themselves.  On  the 
[89] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

occasion  of  a  church  festival  we  saw  the 
Grand  Duke  and  members  of  his  family  in 
garb  of  penitence,  marching  at  the  head  of 
the  procession.  But  on  his  approach  the 
streets  were  deserted. 

We  went  via  Bologna  and  Padua  to 
Venice  where  we  spent  some  days  in  that 
delight  which  Venice  brings  to  every  travel 
ler.  The  city  seems  to  me  to  have  changed 
less  since  that  time  than  any  other  Italian 
city  of  importance. 

We  sailed  thence  to  Trieste  and  then 
made  the  long  journey  by  diligence,  travel 
ling  day  and  night,  to  Gratz,  which  was  even 
then  a  flourishing,  manufacturing  city, 
though  we  like  most  Americans  had  hardly 
known  of  its  existence.  From  Gratz  we 
were  able  to  go  by  rail  to  Vienna.  Partly 
because  we  had  friends  there,  we  spent 
several  days  in  the  Austrian  capital. 

We  were  fortunate  enough  to  be  there  on 
what  was  called  the  Day  of  the  Three  Em 
perors.  There  was  a  military  celebration 
of  the  suppression  of  the  rebellion  of  Hun 
gary.  The  three  sovereigns  present  were  the 
Austrian  Emperor,  Francis  Joseph,  the  Rus 
sian  Emperor,  Nicholas,  and  the  Prussian 
King,  William.  Fifteen  thousand  troops 
were  assembled  on  the  Glacis.  The  Em 
peror  Nicholas  took  command  and  ordered 
[90] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

the  manoeuvres.  He  looked  the  Emperor 
more  than  any  man  I  ever  saw.  Of  the 
gigantic  Romanoff  stature,  of  commanding 
mien,  he  sat  upon  his  powerful  horse  as 
though  ready  in  a  joust  to  meet  any  foe.1 
As  after  the  manoeuvres  were  ended  the 
troops  marched  through  theprincipal  streets, 
they  were  preceded  not  only  by  the  sover 
eigns  and  a  large  number  of  generals  but 
also  by  the  ladies  of  the  Imperial  Austrian 
family  in  their  open  carriages.  Though 
we  young  Americans,  never  having  seen  so 
many  men  under  arms,  were  impressed  by 
the  brilliant  display,  yet  our  sympathy  with 
the  Hungarians  whom  the  Austrian  govern 
ment  had  been  enabled  only  by  Russian 
help  to  defeat,  led  us  to  look  on  with  an  in 
ward  protest,  especially  as  we  had  seen  the 
breaches  in  the  city  walls  which  the  Hun 
garian  revolutionists  had  made  with  their 
cannon  as  they  were  on  the  point  of  gaining 
their  independence. 

In  these  later  years,  when  the  affection 
ate  loyalty  of  the  Austrians  to  Francis 

1  On  the  day  before  this  parade  we  visited  the  Imperial 
stables.  Noticing  one  horse  standing  in  his  stable  with 
two  heavy  sacks  on  his  back,  we  were  told  that  he  was 
to  bear  the  Emperor  Nicholas,  and  was  in  training  for 
the  unaccustomed  load,  as  the  Emperor  weighed  two 
hundred  and  forty  pounds. 

[91] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Joseph  has  apparently  saved  the  Empire 
from  dissolution,  I  have  often  recalled  the 
statements  made  to  me  by  a  highly  intelli 
gent  Viennese  during  this  visit.  He  said 
that  the  young  Emperor  who  had  recently 
come  to  the  throne  was  really  hated  then 
by  the  populace  for  his  cruel  and  over 
bearing  manner.  He  gave  as  an  illustration 
the  statement  that  a  student  crossing  the 
Glacis  in  a  snow  storm  with  his  head  down 
did  not  see  the  Emperor  who  was  passing, 
and  so  did  not  salute  him,  and  that  the 
Emperor  was  so  affronted  that  he  caused 
the  innocent  offender  to  be  flogged. 
Whether  this  report  was  true,  I  cannot 
say.  But  that  it  could  be  circulated  in 
dicated  a  feeling  utterly  different  from  that 
which  his  subjects  now  cherish  towards 
him. 

While  at  Vienna  I  received  a  letter  from 
President  Wayland,  offering  me  as  I  might 
prefer  either  the  Chair  of  Civil  Engineering 
or  that  of  the  Modern  Languages  in  Brown 
University,  with  permission  to  remain 
abroad  a  year  and  a  half  for  the  purpose  of 
study.  After  deliberation,  I  decided  to 
accept  the  Chair  of  Modern  Languages. 
My  throat  had  so  far  regained  its  strength 
that  I  thought  I  could  venture  to  try  the 
experiment  of  teaching. 
[92] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

We  made  brief  visits  at  Prague,  Dresden, 
Berlin,  and  Cologne  on  our  way  to  Paris. 
Here  Mr.  Hazard  left  me  on  June  10,  1852, 
and  returned  home  via  England.  I  began 
the  search  for  a  teacher  of  French.  After 
a  little  I  had  the  good  fortune  to  make  the 
acquaintance  of  Monsieur  Jansen  who  had 
once  been  a  Professor  in  a  Lycee,  but  had 
been  thrown  out  of  office  owing  to  his 
radical  republicanisn,  He  was  a  guileless, 
scholarly  man,  without  much  skill  in  mak 
ing  his  way  in  the  world,  especially  in  the 
troublous  times  which  had  come  to  France. 
He  detested  Louis  Napoleon  and  all  his  fol 
lowers  and  believed  that  the  eyes  of  spies 
were  always  upon  him.  He  had  a  charming 
wife,  one  of  the  best  type  of  the  intelligent, 
well-bred,  frugal  woman  of  the  middle 
class,  and  a  diffident  gentle  daughter  of 
eighteen  years.  Into  this  charming  house 
hold  I  was  permitted  to  come  as  a  boarder 
and  a  pupil.  It  was  a  surprising  revelation 
to  me  who,  like  most  young  Americans,  had 
formed  my  ideas  of  French  domestic  life 
from  sensational  stories  of  Parisian  adven 
tures,  to  see  the  beautiful  simplicity  of  this 
quiet  and  virtuous  French  home.  I  soon 
learned  that  this  was  not  an  exceptional 
home.  Perhaps  in  no  particular  have  Eng 
lish  and  Americans  been  so  far  astray  in 
[93] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

their  judgments  of  the  French  people  as  in 
respect  to  the  purity  of  their  domestic  life. 
Monsieur  Jansen  lived  in  Passy,  on  the 
Avenue  de  St.  Cloud,  just  outside  of  the 
Arc  de  Triomphe  de  1'Etoile.  It  was  an 
easy  stroll  to  the  Bois  de  Boulogne,  whither 
I  often  went  with  my  books.  Frequently 
with  the  family  I  went  on  a  picnic  to  St. 
Cloud  or  some  other  attractive  spot.  On 
Sundays  I  usually  went  to  the  Church  of  the 
Oratoire,  where  I  heard  some  of  the  most 
eloquent  Protestant  preachers.  One  pe 
culiar,  but  rather  commendable  custom  of 
the  preachers,  which  I  have  never  seen 
spoken  of  in  books,  I  noticed  with  interest. 
Their  style  was  picturesque  or  dramatic. 
After  an  eloquent  passage  which  closed  one 
division  or  head  of  the  sermon,  the  preacher 
would  pause  to  clear  his  throat  or  use  his 
handkerchief,  and  the  whole  congregation 
availed  themselves  of  that  opportunity  to  do 
the  same  thing.  Then  as  he  proceeded,  he 
was  not  interrupted  by  coughing.  In  due 
time  he  paused  again  for  the  same  purpose, 
and  the  congregation  imitated  him  once 
more.  Occasionally  I  went  to  the  Sor- 
bonne  or  the  College  de  France  and  heard 
lectures.  But  in  the  main  I  gave  my  at 
tention  to  writing  French  and  conversing 
and  reading  French  literature.  One  inter- 
[94] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

esting  and  instructive  diversion  was  after 
reading  French  history  to  go  to  Versailles 
and  see  the  historical  pictures  which  adorn 
the  walls. 

In  October,  1852,  I  left  Paris  for  Ger 
many.  I  travelled  through  Holland  and 
went  to  Braunschweig  to  study  German.  I 
found  an  excellent  home  in  the  house  of 
Herr  Sack,  the  clerk  of  the  Circuit  Court, 
an  elderly  man  who  had  fought  in  the  Battle 
of  Waterloo  and  was  a  somewhat  noted 
local  antiquary.  His  eldest  daughter,  who 
was  a  teacher  in  a  private  school  and  was  a 
scholar  of  large  reading  in  English  as  well  as 
in  German  literature,  became  my  teacher. 
She  was  most  competent.  I  have  always 
regarded  myself  as  so  greatly  indebted  to 
her  that  I  continued  correspondence  with 
her  until  her  death  in  1907.  I  know  few 
American  women  who  can  recite  so  many 
fine  passages  from  English  poets  as  she 
could.  I  was  impressed  by  this  and  other 
facts  with  the  excellent  literary  training 
which  the  German  schools  gave  their  girls, 

One  book  from  the  father's  pen  was  a 
striking  illustration  of  the  German  thor 
oughness  (Grtindlichkeit),  which  I  had 
occasion  so  often  to  remark  in  German 
writers.  In  early  times  the  Bruns wickers 
of  wealth  and  rank  placed  elaborate  family 
[95] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

\ 

coats-of-arms  on  their  chimneys  in  con 
spicuous  positions.  Herr  Sack  found  in 
these  with  their  mottoes  a  valuable  con 
tribution  to  the  history  of  the  city.  So  he 
wrote  a  book  on  the  History  of  the  Chim 
neys  of  Brunswick.  It  was  divided  into 
two  parts.  In  order  to  lay  a  proper  foun 
dation  for  his  interpretation  of  the  sym 
bols,  he  devoted  the  first  part  to  the  history 
of  chimneys  in  Greece  and  Rome  and  there 
reached  the  conclusion  that  the  Greeks  and 
Romans  had  no  chimneys.  Not  till  he  had 
done  this  was  he  prepared  to  discuss  the 
History  of  Chimneys  in  Brunswick. 

So  far  as  I  could  learn  I  was  the  first 
American  ever  known  in  Brunswick.  One 
South  American  from  Bogota  arrived  there 
before  me.  But  as  people  generally  knew 
nothing  of  Bogota,  he  used  in  company  to 
draw  near  to  me,  throw  his  arm  across  my 
shoulder,  and  say  somewhat  ostentatiously, 
"Ach!  wir  sind  Amerikaner." 

I  was  invited  to  join  a  club  of  German 
gentlemen  who  met  occasionally  to  speak 
English  and  who  wished  me  to  correct  their 
expressions  when  necessary.  It  so  hap 
pened  that  for  some  time  the  only  member 
to  whom  English  was  vernacular  was  a 
mechanical  engineer  from  London,  con 
nected  with  the  railway.  He  was  illiterate 
[96] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

and  his  speech  was  pure  cockney.  I  was 
soon  embarrassed  by  their  remarking  the 
differences  between  his  speech  and  mine, 
and  asking  for  explanations.  These  I  gave 
when  he  was  not  present. 

" Uncle  Tom's  Cabin"  by  Mrs.  Stowe 
appeared  while  I  was  in  Brunswick,  and  was 
read  with  great  eagerness.  But  many  of  my 
acquaintances  were  puzzled  by  Topsy's 
English,  and  could  find  no  help  in  their 
dictionaries.  For  a  time  I  could  scarcely 
take  a  walk  on  the  street  without  being 
accosted,  occasionally  by  strangers  to  whom 
I  had  been  pointed  out  as  an  American,  for 
aid  in  interpreting  the  negro  dialect. 

In  this  connection  I  am  tempted  to  de 
scribe  an  adventure  which  befell  me  in  a 
school  to  which  English  and  Irish  girls  of 
good  families  had  been  sent  to  learn  Ger 
man.  The  proprietor  of  the  school  was  a 
relative  of  the  Sacks  with  whom  I  was  liv 
ing.  So  I  was  invited  with  them  to  a 
Christmas  supper  at  the  school.  I  was 
seated  at  the  table  at  a  safe  distance  from 
the  girls  who  appeared  to  be  from  fourteen 
to  eighteen  years  of  age.  At  the  close  of 
the  supper  I  was  surprised  to  receive, 
through  the  host,  a  request  from  the  girls 
that  I  would  say  a  few  words  in  American. 
It  had  not  occurred  to  me  that  they  could 
[97] 

8 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

be  ignorant  of  the  fact  that  English  is  our 
vernacular.  But  as  it  appeared  that  they 
were,  I  thought  an  innocent  trick  was  allow 
able.  So  I  arose  and  made  a  speech  in  what 
in  my  childhood  we  boys  called  "hog 
Latin."  It  consists  in  beginning  a  word 
with  the  last  syllable  and  then  recurring 
to  the  first:  e.g.,  the  word  "German" 
would  appear  as  "man-o-ger."  Of  course 
there  was  resemblance  enough  in  some 
words  to  the  real  words  so  that  they  would 
catch  a  little  of  what  I  was  saying.  But 
they  were  much  bewildered.  And  the  Ger 
man  hearers  were  even  more  so.  I  sat 
down  amid  hearty  applause.  The  young 
ladies  sent  up  an  expression  of  thanks.  I 
never  explained  the  trick  to  my  German 
friends  until  I  went  to  Brunswick  forty 
years  later. 

The  tenor  singer  in  the  Brunswick  Opera 
Company  and  his  wife  occupied  a  room 
directly  under  mine.  He  was  a  very  genial, 
jolly  fellow,  and  I  used  often  to  walk  with 
him.  Through  him  I  made  the  acquain 
tance  in  his  rooms  of  his  associates  in  the 
Opera  Company.  As  the  members  of  the 
company  hold  permanent  positions  in  a 
German  city,  I  met  them  at  times  in  general 
society.  They  presented  to  me  a  new  side 
of  life.  Ijound  them  very  companionable 
[98] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

and  entertaining,  but  was  surprised  to  ob 
serve  that  most  of  them  had  very  limited 
attainments  beyond  their  professional  train 
ing.  The  breath  of  their  life  seemed  to  be 
public  applause  of  their  performances,  and 
perhaps  as  a  consequence  of  this  they  were 
very  jealous  of  each  other's  success.  Most 
of  them  mingled  with  their  neighbours 
without  attracting  more  especial  attention 
than  other  respectable  citizens. 

I  spent  a  pleasant  afternoon  with  Herr 
Sack,  visiting  the  great  library  at  Wolfen- 
biittel,  then  in  charge  of  an  aged  librarian 
who,  though  utterly  blind,  could  lay  his 
hand  on  any  book  he  sought  in  the  great 
collection. 

It  was  on  the  whole  a  most  profitable  and 
enjoyable  winter  that  I  spent  in  Brunswick. 
In  April,  1853, 1  left  the  circle  of  friends,  by 
whom  I  had  been  most  hospitably  received, 
with  sincere  regret,  in  order  to  attend  lec 
tures  on  modern  German  literature  at  the 
University  of  Berlin. 

I  took  lodgings  near  the  middle  of  the 
city.  I  was  disappointed  in  applying  at  the 
University  to  find  that  there  was  no  course 
to  be  given  on  the  subject  I  wished  to 
study.  I  sent  to  several  Universities  and 
could  learn  of  no  such  course  except  at 
Munich.  While  I  was  busy  in  this  quest, 
[99] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

and  was  seeking  to  procure  from  the  city 
authorities  the  ordinary  permission  to  oc 
cupy  lodgings,  I  was  surprised  to  be  in 
formed  by  the  police  officers  who  had 
received  my  passport  that  I  could  not 
receive  that  permission  in  the  usual  form. 
On  the  contrary  I  was  directed  to  report 
twice  a  week  in  person  at  the  police  office. 
In  answer  to  my  inquiry  for  the  reason  of 
this  extraordinary  demand,  I  was  told  that 
revolutionists  with  the  spirit  of  1848  were 
busy,  that  bombs  and  other  munitions  had 
been  found  in  the  attic  of  a  storehouse,  and 
that  Germans  bearing  American  passports 
were  supposed  to  be  coming  to  town  to  en 
gage  in  lawless  enterprises.  :<Well,"  I 
said,  "how  does  that  concern  me?"  "Well, 
we  thought  you  might  be  one  of  these  Ger 
mans."  "It  is  very  flattering,"  I  replied, 
"to  be  regarded  by  you  as  a  German.  Will 
you  not  be  good  enough  to  tell  me  why  you 
have  taken  me  for  a  German?"  "Well," 
was  the  reply,  "you  have  a  square  head  and 
light  hair  and  complexion,  in  short,  look 
like  a  German."  "But,"  I  rejoined,  "you 
must  see  that  I  do  not  speak  your  language 
like  a  German.  I  have  been  in  your  coun 
try  only  a  few  months."  ;<Yes,"  said  the 
official,  "but  the  foreign  accent  could  be 
assumed." 

[100] 


JAMES    B.     ANX5 

I  could  not  argue  against  "Caesar  with 
his  ten  legions."  After  a  week's  sojourn 
under  these  conditions,  reflecting  that  only 
in  Munich  could  I  find  the  lectures  I  wanted, 
I  resolved  to  go  there.  So  I  went  to  the 
police  office  and  demanded  my  passport, 
vised  for  Munich.  To  my  surprise  and  to 
my  temporary  satisfaction  the  officer  could 
not  find  it.  I  saw  at  once  that  there  I  had 
him  at  my  mercy.  In  those  days  a  pass 
port  was  regarded  in  official  circles  as  such 
a  sacrosanct  document  that  a  police  official 
could  hardly  commit  a  more  serious  offence 
than  to  lose  it.  So  I  assumed  the  menac 
ing  air,  and  told  him  that  if  the  passport  was 
not  at  my  room  vised  within  three  hours  I 
would  report  the  case  to  the  American 
Charge  for  complaint  to  the  Government. 
It  was  delivered  to  me  within  the  time  and 
I  set  out  for  Munich. 

On  the  way  I  spent  a  day  or  two  with 
intense  delight  at  Nuremburg,  in  which  it 
was  so  easy  to  reproduce  in  imagination  the 
mediaeval  life  of  Hans  Sachs'  time.  I  also 
stopped  at  Augsburg. 

At  Munich  the  police  office  at  first  de 
clined  to  give  me  permission  to  reside,  be 
cause  in  my  application  I  wrote  out  my 
middle  name  in  full,  while  my  passport 
contained  merely  the  initial  letter  of  my 
[101] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

middle  name.  It  required  an  argument  to 
convince  the  stupid  official  of  my  identity. 

One  of  my  first  pleasures  in  Munich  was 
that  of  hearing  the  great  chemist  Liebig 
lecture.  Of  all  the  professors  I  heard,  he 
was  the  most  attractive  in  manner.  It 
proved  to  be  his  son-in-law,  Moritz  Carriere, 
who  gave  the  course  in  modern  German 
literature  which  I  came  to  hear.  I  wanted 
especially  to  listen  to  discourses  on  Lessing, 
Goethe,  and  Schiller.  As  I  had  six  weeks 
at  my  disposal,  and  Carriere  was  announced 
for  three  lectures  a  week,  I  hoped  I  might 
get  some  valuable  instruction.  He  was  an 
excellent  lecturer.  But  alas!  the  old  Ger 
man  "Grlindlichkeit,"  if  not  so  striking  as 
that  of  Herr  Sack  in  his  "History  of  the 
Chimneys  of  Brunswick,"  proved  fatal. 
For  he  began  back  with  the  Germans  of 
whom  I  had  read  in  the  Germania  of 
Tacitus,  and  in  my  six  weeks  had  only  got 
down  towards  the  modern  times  as  far  as 
the  translation  of  the  Bible  by  Ulfilas. 
However,  I  heard  other  excellent  lectures 
on  the  Ancient  Classics,  and  enjoyed  much 
the  visits  to  the  galleries  of  art.  My  so 
journ  was  not  without  profit  and  pleasure. 

From  Munich  I  went  to  Zurich.  After  a 
short  stay  there  I  crossed  the  lake  and 
walked  over  the  Briinig  Pass  to  Thun  and 
[102] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

Berne,  and  travelled  thence  by  diligence  to 
Geneva  and  thence  by  diligence  and  rail  to 
Paris.  I  received  a  hearty  welcome  from 
my  old  friends,  the  Jansens,  with  whom  I 
remained  about  six  weeks.  During  this 
sojourn  in  Paris  I  had  the  pleasure  of  meet 
ing  at  dinner  at  the  house  of  a  friend,  Mon 
sieur  Sainte-Beuve,  the  great  critic,  whose 
writings  had  greatly  attracted  me.  He  was 
most  genial  and  interesting.  He  was  of 
medium  height,  inclined  to  embonpoint,  and 
for  some  reason  which  I  should  be  puzzled 
to  explain  reminded  me  of  the  picture  I  had 
always  formed  to  myself  of  the  poet  Horace. 
From  Paris  in  July  I  made  a  hurried 
journey  through  England,  spending  a  week 
in  London,  then  passing  by  Stratford,  War 
wick,  Oxford,  and  York,  to  Edinburgh  and 
Glasgow  and  to  Liverpool,  whence  I  sailed 
on  July  29  for  Philadelphia.  We  had  a 
wonderfully  smooth  voyage.  The  steamer 
soon  sailed  on  her  return  voyage,  and  was 
never  heard  from.  I  stopped  in  New  York, 
where  the  first  of  our  national  expositions 
was  being  held.  I  remember  seeing  a  good 
farmer  and  his  wife  gazing  on  the  casts 
of  Thorwaldsen's  Christ  and  the  Apostles, 
and  concluding  after  some  discussion  that 
they  were  the  Presidents  of  the  United 
States. 

[103] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

I  reached  my  father's  house  in  Scituate 
after  an  absence  of  nearly  two  years.  I 
learned  that  both  my  maternal  grandparents 
had  died  since  my  last  letters  had  reached 
me  abroad.  I  was  especially  grieved  at  the 
death  of  my  grandmother.  It  was  from 
her  that  my  dear  mother  inherited  most  of 
her  traits. 


[104] 


IV 

THE  PROFESSORSHIP  IN  BROWN 
UNIVERSITY  AND  EDITORSHIP 
OF  THE  PROVIDENCE  JOURNAL 

I  WAS  twenty-four  years  of  age  when  I 
entered  on  the  duties  of  my  professorship. 
I  was  the  youngest  member  of  the  Faculty. 
Most  of  the  professors  had  been  my  teach 
ers.  Professor  Robinson  P.  Dunn,  who  had 
recently  been  called  to  the  Chair  of  Rhetoric 
and  English  Literature,  was  only  a  few 
years  my  senior.  He  became  at  once  my 
intimate  companion  and  a  most  congenial 
associate  in  my  studies.  I  was  well  aware 
that  my  preparation  for  my  special  work 
was  less  adequate  than  I  could  have  de 
sired.  I  purposed  to  return  to  Europe  for 
further  study  as  soon  as  I  had  liquidated 
the  debt  I  had  incurred  in  my  sojourn  in 
Europe.  I  was  particularly  desirous  of 
studying  the  Italian  language  and  litera 
ture.  I  had  become  deeply  interested  in 
tracing  the  influence  of  the  leading  Euro 
pean  literatures  on  each  other.  I  soon  wrote 
articles  for  the  North  American  Review, 
[105] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

under  the  encouragement  of  its  scholarly 
editor,  Dr.  Andrew  P.  Peabody,  pointing 
out  to  some  extent  the  interaction  of  the 
French,  German,  and  English  literatures. 
I  cherished  the  hope  that  on  a  visit  to 
Europe  I  might  write  a  book  of  some 
worth  on  the  reciprocal  influence  of  the 
chief  literatures  on  each  other.  Like  many 
another  dream  of  early  years  that  has  re 
mained  only  a  dream.  But,  in  my  teach 
ing,  which  was  necessarily  elementary,  since 
most  of  my  students  began  the  study  of  the 
modern  languages  with  me,  I  strove  and 
not  without  fair  success,  I  hope,  to  imbue 
them  with  some  enthusiasm  for  the  study 
of  the  great  authors  to  whom  I  introduced 
them. 

It  was  an  interesting  period  in  the  his 
tory  of  the  University  when  I  entered  upon 
my  official  connection  with  it.  President 
Way  land,  who  was  a  pioneer  in  the  reform 
of  our  traditional  collegiate  system,  had 
induced  the  Corporation  to  make  important 
innovations.  As  early  as  1842  he  had  pub 
lished  a  small  book  entitled  "Thoughts  on 
the  Present  Collegiate  System  in  the  United 
States,"  in  which  he  had  pointed  out  what 
he  regarded  as  some  of  the  defects  in  that 
system.  He  maintained  that  the  colleges 
were  not  furnishing  the  education  which 
[106] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

was  needed  to  meet  our  wants,  especially 
that  they  were  not  training  men  in  science 
and  its  applications  to  life.  The  book  at 
tracted  some  attention,  but  not  so  much  as 
it  deserved. 

Further  observation  and  reflection  con 
firmed  him  in  the  opinion  that  a  change  in 
the  organization  of  our  colleges  ought  to  be 
attempted.  In  a  report  to  the  Trustees  of 
Brown  University  in  1850  he  so  impressed 
them  with  his  views  that  they  raised  a  fund, 
large  for  those  days,  for  the  reorganiza 
tion  of  the  work  of  their  institution  in 
accordance  with  his  ideas.  He  provided 
for  more  generous  work  in  the  sciences  and 
in  modern  languages  and  in  engineering 
and  large  liberty  in  the  election  of  studies. 
He  really  opened  the  way  for  that  broaden 
ing  and  liberalizing  of  collegiate  study 
which  in  a  few  years  prevailed  to  a  con 
siderable  extent  in  every  American  college 
of  standing.  He  was  the  pioneer  who 
broke  away  from  the  old  traditional  path, 
which  our  colleges  had  followed  from  the 
seventeenth  century,  and  pointed  them  to 
the  road  which  they  are  now  all  following. 
The  credit  which  is  his  due  for  this  service 
he  has  not  always  received.  The  immedi 
ate  consequence  of  the  adoption  of  what 
was  called  the  "new  system"  had  been  a 
[107] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

large  increase  in  the  attendance,  and  a  cer 
tain  enthusiasm  among  the  students  about 
this  new  departure.  This  was  favourable 
to  the  work  in  my  department.  Extension 
lectures,  which  have  since  been  introduced 
by  some  universities  in  this  country  and  in 
England  in  order  to  bring  university  in 
struction  to  the  masses,  were  given  by 
Professor  Chase  to  the  jewellers  and  by  Pro 
fessor  Caswell  to  the  mechanics  in  Provi 
dence.  The  college  which  had  not  been  in 
close  touch  with  the  people  of  the  State 
was  brought  nearer  to  them  by  lyceum  lec 
tures  given  by  members  of  the  Faculty.  I 
went  out  frequently  to  lecture  on  "Life  in 
Europe"  and  on  education.  But  in  spite 
of  the  enthusiasm  with  which  Dr.  Wayland 
and  some  of  his  friends  gave  a  new  impulse 
to  the  college,  serious  difficulties  were  en 
countered  in  carrying  into  effect  his  cher 
ished  plans.  Some  of  trie  Professors  had 
not  much  sympathy  with  his  ideas  of  re 
form.  The  funds  raised  to  carry  the  "new 
system"  into  operation,  though  regarded  as 
adequate  when  they  were  raised,  proved 
insufficient.  The  President  finally  became 
discouraged  and  resigned  his  place  in  1855. 
He  was  succeeded  by  Dr.  Sears,  who  was 
friendly  to  the  traditional  ideas  of  college 
work  rather  than  to  Dr.  Wayland's.  There- 
[108] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

fore  from  the  time  of  his  accession  to  office 
the  spirit  of  collegiate  reform  visibly  lan 
guished.  But  the  impulse  which  had  been 
given  to  the  college  was  not  wholly  lost. 
In  the  classes  which  I  had  the  pleasure  of 
teaching,  were  not  a  few  whose  subsequent 
careers  reflected  much  honour  on  themsleves 
and  on  the  University.  Most  conspicuous 
among  them  are  Richard  Olney  of  the  class 
of  1856,  and  John  Hay,  of  the  class  of  1858. 
Both  gave  marked  promise.  Mr.  Olney, 
afterwards  Attorney-general  and  then  Secre 
tary  of  State  of  the  United  States,  showed 
the  traits  of  mind  which  characterize  the 
profound  lawyer.  For  Mr.  Hay  one  would 
have  predicted  a  brilliant  literary  future. 
I  have  often  said  that  he  was  the  most 
felicitous  translator  I  ever  met  in  my 
classes.  He  wrote  verses  of  unusual  merit 
for  an  undergraduate.  He  was  modest  even 
to  diffidence,  often  blushing  to  the  roots  of 
his  hair  when  he  rose  to  recite.  In  the 
years  of  his  middle  life,  and  especially  after 
the  production  of  his  books  on  Spanish  life, 
written  in  so  picturesque  a  style,  I  used  in 
common  with  many  of  his  friends  to  regret 
that  circumstances  had  diverted  him  from 
a  purely  literary  career.  But  we  all  rejoice 
now  that  Providence  placed  him  in  the  chair 
of  Secretary  of  State,  at  a  time  when  he  could 
[109] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

be  of  such  transcendent  service  to  us  and  to 
the  Eastern  world.  As  I  happened  to  be 
on  the  steamer  with  him  when  he  was 
returning  from  the  Embassy  at  London,  I 
know  from  my  conversation  with  him  on 
the  voyage  that  he  entered  on  the  duties  of 
that  high  office  with  hesitancy  and  mis 
giving.  He  said  to  me,  "I  accepted  it  be 
cause  it  is  an  office  that  one  can  hardly 
refuse." 

When  I  entered  on  the  duties  of  the  pro 
fessorship,  the  curricula  were  so  arranged 
that  my  students  could  carry  the  work  in 
the  modern  languages  and  literatures  to  a 
somewhat  advanced  stage,  and  to  my  great 
satisfaction.  But  later  changes  were  made 
which  restricted  my  classes  to  one  year's 
work  in  each  of  the  languages.  This  ele 
mentary  teaching  soon  became  rather  un 
inspiring  to  me.  I  used  to  say  it  did  not 
seem  to  stretch  the  flexor  muscles  of  the 
mind. 

Partly  owing  to  this  fact,  by  an  arrange 
ment  with  Governor  Anthony,  editor  and 
chief  proprietor  of  the  Providence  Journal, 
while  I  was  holding  the  chair  in  college,  I 
wrote  regularly  leading  articles,  chiefly  on 
foreign  affairs.  When  he  was  elected  to  the 
United  States  Senate  in  1858,  I  assumed 
responsibility,  for  1859,  of  all  the  leading 
[110] 


.    JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

articles,  while  James  S.  Ham  acted  as 
managing  editor.  This  attempt  to  carry 
both  my  college  work  and  my  editorial 
work  did  not  prove  satisfactory  to  me. 
During  the  year,  Senator  Anthony  proposed 
that  I  should  resign  my  position  at  the 
college  and  take  the  editorial  charge  of  the 
newspaper.  The  college  salary  was  very 
small  and  there  seemed  to  be  no  prospect 
of  an  increase.  The  Journal  held  a  very 
commanding  position.  The  great  ques 
tions  which  the  North  and  South  were  soon 
to  submit  to  the  dread  arbitrament  of  war 
were  already  under  discussion.  The  field 
for  earnest  and  patriotic  editorial  work  was 
very  inviting.  I  decided  to  exchange  the 
professor's  chair  for  the  editor's. 

I  was  called  on  at  various  times  to  give 
lectures  in  and  near  Providence.  1  first 
wrote  out  some  lectures  and  read  them.  I 
soon  found  that  this  was  not  the  most  effec 
tive  mode  of  lecturing  and  moreover  that  it 
made  too  great  a  draught  on  my  throat. 
So  I  decided  to  throw  away  manuscript.  I 
thus  acquired  the  habit  of  speaking  with 
out  notes,  which  I  have  followed  through 
my  life  with  few  exceptions  and  then 
against  my  wishes.  Many  of  my  speeches 
I  have  after  delivery  reduced  to  writing  in 
order  to  preserve  them;  but  the  pleasure 

[mi 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

and  effectiveness  of  speaking  without  read 
ing  can  never  be  equalled  by  reading  a 
manuscript. 

It  was  during  the  period  of  my  official 
connection  with  Brown  University  on  No 
vember  26,  1855,  that  I  was  married  to 
Sarah  Swoope  Caswell,  only  daughter  of 
Rev.  Alexis  Caswell,  D.D.,  for  many  years 
Professor  in  the  University  and  afterwards 
its  President.  This  was  the  most  fortunate 
event  in  my  life.  She  was  eminently  fitted 
to  be  my  helpmeet  in  all  the  various  experi 
ences  of  our  lives.  If  I  have  achieved  any 
degree  of  success,  I  owe  it  largely  to  her. 

The  spirit  in  which  Mr.  Anthony  had 
always  conducted  the  Journal  was  that  of 
courtesy  towards  opponents  and  of  optim 
ism  concerning  the  country.  Three  things 
he  insisted  on:  first,  the  Journal  should 
be  a  clean  paper,  even  in  its  advertisements ; 
second,  the  English  should  be  pure;  third, 
whatever  the  Journal  could  do  for  the  hon 
our,  the  prosperity,  the  glory  of  Rhode 
Island  should  be  done  at  any  sacrifice. 
For  us  who  were  left  in  his  absence  to  carry 
on  the  work  it  was  the  tradition  and  the 
law  to  let  his  spirit  prevail,  so  far  as  we 
could  attain  to  it,  in  all  departments  of  the 
paper.  Accordingly  at  the  end  of  the 
academic  year,  1859-60, 1  resigned  my  chair 
[112] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

in  the  college  and  accepted  the  invitation  to 
take  the  editorship,  subject  of  course  to  the 
control  of  the  Senator.  That  position  I  held 
from  the  summer  of  1860  to  the  summer  of 
1866.  A  more  interesting  and  important 
period  for  the  responsible  post  of  con 
ducting  such  a  newspaper  has  not  been 
presented  in  our  history.  Few  of  the  news 
papers  in  the  country  have  so  won  the 
confidence  and  so  controlled  the  opinions 
of  their  constituency  as  the  Providence 
Journal  under  the  editorship  of  Henry  B. 
Anthony.  Its  opponents  used  to  say  that 
its  readers  considered  it  their  political  bible, 
and  opened  it  in  the  morning  to  know  what 
they  ought  to  think.  The  opportunity,  the 
privilege,  the  duty  of  such  a  journal  at 
such  an  epoch,  no  one  comprehended  more 
thoroughly  than  Senator  Anthony.  Never 
was  there  a  more  indulgent  chief.  He  left 
us  in  the  offices  the  utmost  liberty  com 
patible  with  the  general  policy  of  the  paper. 
Though  with  my  limited  experience  I  must 
have  made  mistakes,  I  do  not  remember 
that  he  ever  complained  to  me  or  ever 
criticized  me,  except  as  criticisms  may 
sometimes  have  been  gently  implied  in 
suggestions. 

Those  who  now  enter  the  spacious  offices 
of  the  Journal  and  see  its  large  mechanical 
[113] 

9 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

outfit  and  its  force  of  writers,  reporters,  and 
clerks,  will  have  difficulty  in  understanding 
on  how  modest  a  scale  it  was  then  con 
ducted.  The  efficient  clerk  at  the  desk  in 
the  counting  room  was  the  only  accountant. 
I  not  only  wrote  as  a  rule  all  the  editorial 
articles,  but  read  all  the  exchanges  and  made 
the  clippings  and  supervised  and  edited  all 
communications.  We  had  no  regular  re 
porter  except  the  marine  reporter  who  was 
a  compositor  and  set  up  all  the  news  he 
gathered.  When  I  wished  a  reporter  I  sent 
out  and  found  one.  Two  or  three  college 
students  held  themselves  subject  to  my  call 
when  I  could  find  them.  After  the  war 
came  on  I  engaged  some  young  officer  in 
each  Rhode  Island  regiment  and  battery, 
generally  one  of  my  college  pupils,  to  send 
correspondence  from  the  front.  Not  in 
frequently,  after  I  had  gone  home  at  a  late 
hour,  the  foreman  of  the  printing  office 
receiving  some  important  war  news,  brought 
it  to  my  house  and  I  crept  out  of  bed  and 
in  very  slender  attire  wrote  an  article  for 
him  to  take  back. 

In  respect  to  the  questions  which  engaged 
public  attention  in  the  months  preceding 
the  war,  I,  like  most  young  men,  shared  the 
views  of  the  more  radical  wing  of  the  Re 
publican  party  in  Rhode  Island.  But  the 
[114] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

business  relations  of  our  cotton  brokers  and 
manufacturers  in  that  State  with  the  South 
had  been  so  close  that  a  large  portion,  per 
haps  a  majority,  of  the  party  were  very 
conservative,  and  ready  to  concede  much 
to  the  South  to  avoid  a  conflict.  Some  of 
the  elderly  citizens  of  wealth  and  influence 
from  time  to  time  laboured  earnestly  with 
me  to  convince  me  of  my  errors  and  to  per 
suade  me  to  commit  the  paper  to  a  less 
dangerous  policy. 

The  election  of  a  governor  of  the  State 
was  the  occasion  of  a  rupture  in  the  party. 
A  worthy  grocer,  Mr.  Seth  Padelford,  by 
active  canvassing  secured  the  gubernatorial 
nomination  at  the  Republican  State  Con 
vention,  and  in  accordance  with  usage  the 
Journal  supported  him  as  the  regular 
nominee.  His  nomination  was  distasteful 
to  a  large  number  of  the  prominent  Re 
publicans  in  Providence.  They  persuaded 
William  Sprague,  a  wealthy  young  manu 
facturer,  to  accept  a  nomination  against 
him.  One  of  the  principal  arguments  which 
they  adduced  for  opposing  Padelford  was 
that  he  had  at  some  time  given  a  hundred 
dollars  to  circulate  a  volume  written  by 
Hinton  Rowan  Helper  of  North  Carolina, 
to  show  that  on  economic  grounds  slavery 
was  injurious  to  the  South,  This  was 
[115] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

loudly  proclaimed  as  a  proof  that  Mr. 
Padelford  was  an  abolitionist  and  so  un 
friendly  to  the  South.  I  believe  Mr.  Padel 
ford  had  in  fact  never  read  the  book.  Of 
course  it  fell  to  me  to  make  as  good  a  fight 
for  him  against  many  of  the  old  friends  of 
the  Journal  as  I  could.  The  strong  bank 
account  of  the  Spragues  was  heavily  drawn 
upon,  and  Mr.  Padelford  who  spent  his 
money  freely  was  defeated. 

During  the  campaign  two  or  three  gen 
tlemen,  who  were  managing  the  Sprague 
campaign,  waited  on  me  and  asked  if  the 
Journal  could  be  bought.  (They  had  no 
newspaper  then.)  I  replied  that  I  did  not 
own  it,  but  that  I  presumed  that  like  other 
property  it  could  be  bought  if  enough  was 
offered  for  it.  They  talked  on  for  some 
time  rather  vaguely,  until  at  last  it  appeared 
that  they  did  not  care  to  buy  it  unless  I  was 
bought  with  it.  When  I  discovered  this  I 
replied,  holding  up  my  quill  pen,  "As  I  have 
said,  I  presume  you  can  buy  the  Journal, 
but  the  Spragues  have  not  money  enough 
to  buy  this  quill."  Whereupon  they  with 
drew. 

Another  interesting  incident  occurred  in 
the  campaign.  We  invited  Abraham  Lin 
coln  to  make  a  speech  in  Providence.  He 
had  come  to  New  York  to  give  his  Address, 
[116] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

now  so  famous,  which  shows  that  the 
Fathers  of  the  Republic  lived  in  the  hope  of 
the  ultimate  extinction  of  slavery.  He  was 
an  entire  stranger  in  Providence;  and 
when  he  appeared  on  the  stage  with  his 
long,  lank  figure,  his  loose  frock  coat,  his 
hair  just  cut  rather  close,  his  homely  face, 
we  were  rather  disappointed.  But  as  he 
proceeded  with  his  speech  our  solicitude 
disappeared.  It  so  happened  that  I  sat  by 
the  side  of  the  editor  of  the  Democratic 
paper,  Welcome  B.  Sayles.1  At  the  close 
of  the  address  he  said  to  me,  "That  is  the 
finest  constitutional  argument  for  a  popu 
lar  audience  that  I  ever  heard."  And  cer 
tainly  I  agreed  with  him. 

It  was  not  long  before  the  speaker 
was  nominated  for  the  Presidency.  Rhode 
Island  like  other  Eastern  states  had  hoped 
for  the  nomination  of  Seward.  And  when 
the  news  of  Lincoln's  nomination  came, 
we  recalled  that  awkward  figure  which 
we  had  seen  in  Railroad  Hall,  and  heard 
the  commendations  of  him  as  a  rail-split 
ter,  and  we  wondered  whether  he  was 
to  prove  the  leader  we  needed  for  the 
trying  days  we  were  expecting.  So  keen 
was  the  disappointment  in  the  State  that 

1  Mr.  Sayles  afterwards  went  to  the  war  as  Colonel  of 
the  Seventh  Rhode  Island  regiment,  and  was  killed. 

[117] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

clearly  an  effort  was  needed  to  secure  him 
earnest  support. 

I  bethought  myself  of  one  source  of  help. 
I  remembered  that  John  Hay,  my  old  pupil, 
was  a  student  of  law  in  Lincoln's  office.  I 
wrote  to  him,  explaining  the  situation  and 
asking  him  to  write  a  few  letters  about  Lin 
coln,  which  would  help  me  in  awakening 
enthusiasm.  He  complied  with  my  request, 
but  he  was  so  accustomed  to  look  at  Lincoln 
with  western  eyes  that  he  dwelt  unduly  for 
my  purpose  on  the  qualities  which  had  made 
him  so  popular  in  Illinois.  I  "edited"  his 
writing  severely  and  published  it.  What 
would  I  not  give  now  for  the  original  manu 
script  which  went  to  the  waste  basket  with 
other  copy! 

During  the  war  the  labour  of  editing  was 
very  severe  but  intensely  interesting.  The 
breach  in  the  Republican  party  was  healed, 
and  finally  Mr.  Padelford  was  elected  Gov 
ernor,  largely  by  the  aid  of  the  supporters 
of  Sprague.  I  found  the  annoyance  of  edi 
torial  life  much  less  than  I  had  anticipated. 
The  office  was  the  gathering  place  for  all  the 
prominent  men  in  the  state.  My  practice 
was  to  write  in  the  outer  room  surrounded 
by  these  men.  I  was  thus  able  to  feel  the 
public  pulse  every  day  and  to  get  many 
excellent  suggestions  from  the  conversation. 
[118] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

I  used  jocosely  to  say  to  some  of  these 
bright  men  that  "I  milked  every  cow  that 
came  into  my  enclosure." 

I  recall  with  interest  visits  to  the  office 
of  many  prominent  men,  among  them 
Charles  Sumner,  Schuyler  Colfax,  Henry  J. 
Raymond,  Editor  of  the  New  York  Times, 
Horace  Greeley,  and  Governor  Andrew. 
Of  all  these  the  most  stimulating  to  the 
young  editor  was  Governor  Andrew,  with 
his  lofty  enthusiasms  and  great  good  sense. 
Mr.  Greeley  having  once  asked  for  a  place 
where  he  could  write,  I  offered  him  my 
table,  which  was  of  the  usual  height.  :<You 
don't  write  at  such  a  table  as  that,  do  you?  " 
said  he.  "Let  me  have  some  books  to  pile 
on  it."  I  piled  up  on  it  the  bound  volumes 
of  the  Congressional  Record,  until  when  he 
was  seated  they  reached  to  his  chin,  and  on 
top  he  spread  his  paper  and  wrote. 

After  George  W.  Danielson  in  1863  be 
came  connected  with  the  Journal,  the  super 
vision  of  the  business,  of  the  printing,  of  the 
local  reporting,  and  of  the  evening  edition, 
called  the  Bulletin,  was  assumed  by  him. 
Perhaps  I  may  properly  say  now  that  he 
and  I  conceived  the  idea  of  purchasing,  if 
practicable,  the  Journal  and  publishing  it  as 
a  non-partisan  independent  newspaper.  But 
Senator  Anthony  was  unwilling  to  sell. 
[119] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

In  1866  the  severity  of  the  work  in  which 
I  had  really  been  engaged  for  eight  years, 
with  only  a  week's  vacation  in  each  year, 
was  beginning  to  affect  my  health.  An 
urgent  call  to  return  to  academic  life  led 
me  to  accept  the  presidency  of  the  Univer 
sity  of  Vermont  in  August  of  that  year. 
But  my  experience  of  newspaper  life  has 
been  of  great  service  to  me  in  all  my  sub 
sequent  career.  Editorial  work  trains  one 
to  both  readiness  and  accuracy  in  writing. 
One  learns  to  say  on  the  first  trial  exactly 
what  one  means  to  say,  and  to  avoid  dif- 
fuseness.  One  who  has  a  responsible  charge 
in  the  conduct  of  a  newspaper  has  large 
opportunities  to  understand  men  and  to 
test  his  own  courage  in  standing  for  what  is 
right  and  conducive  to  the  public  good, 
especially  when  in  his  opinions  he  differs 
from  some  of  his  friends.  It  was  not  with 
out  much  reluctance  that  I  decided  to 
abandon  editorial  life  and  return  to  aca 
demic  work. 


[120] 


THE  PRESIDENCY  OF  THE  UNIVER 
SITY  OF  VERMONT 

THE  University  of  Vermont,  founded  in 
1791,  though  a  small  college,  had  an  hon 
ourable  history.  Its  standard  of  work 
compared  favourably  always  with  the  better 
New  England  colleges.  Eminent  scholars 
had  held  places  in  its  Faculty.  President 
James  Marsh,  one  of  the  first  Americans  to 
commend  Coleridge  to  us,  was  one  of  the 
most  gifted  philosophers  this  country  has 
produced.  President  Wheeler,  Professor 
Joseph  Torrey,  the  translator  of  Neander, 
Professor  Shedd,  afterward  a  member  of  the 
Faculty  of  the  Union  Theological  Semi 
nary  in  New  York,  and  Professor  George 
W.  Benedict,  a  most  energetic  adminis 
trator,  had  given  to  the  college  a  reputation 
which  attracted  students  from  beyond  the 
boundaries  of  the  State.  It  had  a  good 
proportion  of  eminent  graduates. 

The  Civil  War,  however,  had  broken  its 

strength.     A  large  number  of  its  students 

entered   the   army,    and   the   boys   in   the 

academies  were  diverted  from  college  to  the 

[121] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

public  service.  The  resources  of  the  insti 
tution  declined.  Its  friends  became  de 
spondent.  Some  thought  it  must  die. 

But  when  the  so-called  Morrill  Bill,  estab 
lishing  Agricultural  Colleges,  was  passed, 
the  trustees  decided  to  accept  the  endow 
ment  offered  to  Vermont  and  to  organize 
the  college  in  connection  with  the  Univer 
sity.  Senator  Morrill  became  one  of  the 
trustees.  Some  of  the  old  classical  gradu 
ates  feared  the  result. 

My  task  was  to  organize  the  Agricultural 
College  and  effect  a  harmonious  union  with 
the  old  college,  to  aid  in  raising  funds  which 
it  was  clearly  seen  were  needed,  and  to  in 
spire  the  public  and  especially  the  alumni 
with  the  confident  belief  that  the  Institu 
tion  really  had  a  future. 

This  required  all  the  energy  and  enthu 
siasm  which  I  could  command.  In  some 
measure  the  college  had  drifted  away  from 
the  people  in  Burlington,  owing  to  their  de 
spondency  about  it.  One  of  the  first  steps 
my  wife  and  I  took  was  to  bring  the  citizens 
into  close  social  relations  with  the  college. 
The  addition  of  cultivated  young  men  to 
the  Faculty  made  this  easy.  I  then  im 
proved  every  opportunity  to  visit  schools, 
to  lecture  in  many  towns,  to  address  the 
county  and  state  fairs  on  agricultural  edu- 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

cation,  in  fact  to  beat  the  bushes  from 
one  end  of  the  state  to  the  other  in 
order  to  convince  the  public  that  we  were 
alive  and  were  especially  desirous  to  do 
something  for  the  farmers.  I  need  hardly 
add  they  were  the  hardest  class  to  con 
vince  that  we  could  be  of  any  help  to 
them.  With  an  associate  from  the  Trustees 
or  from  the  Faculty,  I  visited  Boston,  New 
York,  and  Washington,  to  obtain  subscrip 
tions.  I  remember  with  pleasure  as  soon  as 
we  reached  Washington,  Henry  J.  Raymond, 
who  was  an  alumnus,  gathered  five  other 
alumni  in  Congress  in  front  of  the  Speaker's 
desk,  before  the  session  opened,  and  after 
making  a  handsome  subscription  himself, 
induced  them  all  to  subscribe.  Thaddeus 
Stevens  was  one  of  them. 

As  we  had  not  funds  enough  to  com 
plete  our  Faculty,  I  set  myself  to  teach  the 
branches  not  provided  for,  namely,  Rhetoric, 
History,  German,  and  International  Law. 

The  persons  who  were  of  the  most  assist 
ance  to  me  in  this  work  of  raising  money 
and  awakening  the  state  were  Grenville  G. 
Benedict,  Secretary  of  the  Corporation,  and 
Professor  Buckham,  who  filled  the  place  of 
President  after  I  left,  until  his  death  in  1910. 

In  all  that  strenuous  life  there  were  some 
amusing  experiences.  I  was  speaking  one 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

day  at  the  State  Fair  at  Brattleboro.  As  I 
sat  down,  a  gentleman  planted  himself 
squarely  before  me  and  exclaimed,  "Sir, 
how  old  are  you?"  I  was  a  little  surprised 
at  being  accosted  thus  by  a  stranger.  Sud 
denly  it  occurred  to  me  that  the  State  Luna 
tic  Asylum  was  in  that  town,  and  I  said  to 
myself,  "This  is  some  harmless  patient  to 
whom  they  have  allowed  liberty."  So  I 
said  to  him,  "Sir,  how  old  are  you?"  He 
replied,  "I  am  thirty -eight."  I  then  said, 
:<That  is  exactly  my  age."  He  went  away 
satisfied.  I  learned  on  inquiry  that  he  was 
pastor  of  a  church  in  the  town. 

Afterwards  in  Vermont,  I  was  repeatedly 
asked  when  introduced  to  a  stranger,  how 
old  I  was.  I  know  of  no  explanation,  out 
of  China,  for  such  a  usage,  except  that  some 
of  the  recent  Presidents  had  been  advanced 
in  years  and  infirm,  and  there  was  genuine 
surprise  at  seeing  one  so  young  as  I  was. 

I  also  once  learned  how  much  it  was  worth 
to  attend  the  funeral  of  a  relative  who  was 
a  benefactor  of  the  college.  A  man  who 
had  given  his  little  property  to  endow  some 
scholarships  on  condition  the  college  should 
pay  his  board  with  a  nephew  and  niece  so 
long  as  he  lived,  finally  died.  I  attended 
the  funeral.  The  nephew  and  niece  accom 
panied  the  body  some  miles  with  me  to  the 
[124] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

burial.  I  told  them  to  send  me  the  bill  for 
the  funeral  expenses.  When  it  came  it 
contained  a  per  diem  charge  for  the  time 
consumed  in  going  to  the  burial.  I  ordered 
the  treasurer  to  pay  that  bill,  since  it  was 
worth  the  price  to  learn  what  one  can  earn 
in  attending  a  relative's  funeral. 

When  I  went  to  Burlington,  I  found  in 
force  a  rule  that  any  student  who  in  his 
whole  college  course  should  have  ten  un- 
excused  absences  must  be  expelled.  I  said 
at  once,  "That  is  a  foolish  rule.  What  will 
happen  is  that  you  will  excuse  the  tenth 
absence.  However,  until  we  change  the 
rule,  I  will  enforce  it." 

A  rather  slack,  self-indulgent  boy  came 
to  me  to  be  excused  to  attend  his  grand 
mother's  funeral.  He  had  nine  unexcused 
absences.  But  of  course  I  excused  him. 
In  two  weeks  he  came  to  be  excused  to  at 
tend  another  grandmother's  funeral.  As 
he  might  have  two  grandmothers,  I  ex 
cused  him  again.  Judge  of  my  surprise 
when  in  two  weeks  more  he  came  to  be  ex 
cused  to  attend  another  grandmother's 
funeral.  "How  is  this,"  I  said,  :'You 
have  been  to  two  grandmother's  funerals." 
:'Yes."  he  replied,  "This  is  my  step-father's 
mother."  "I  see,"  said  I,  "but  mark  my 
word,,  if  you  have  another  grandmother's 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

funeral,  you  will  leave  college."  He  gradu 
ated. 

The  administration  of  a  college  with  a 
small  number  of  students  taught  me  cer 
tain  lessons.  It  gave  me  peculiar  pleasure 
from  my  intimate  personal  acquaintance 
with  each  pupil  and  in  many  cases  with  his 
parents.  Since  I  also  taught  every  one  in 
more  than  one  branch,  I  was  able  to  guide 
and  impress  them  all,  to  direct  their  reading 
and  writing  and  help  shape  their  character 
and  their  plans  as  would  have  been  quite 
impossible  in  a  large  institution.  The  rela 
tions  thus  established  between  me  and  them 
have  been  a  source  of  permanent  gratifica 
tion  to  me  and  I  trust  to  not  a  few  of  them. 

Nor  can  I  refrain  from  recalling  the  friend 
ship  formed  with  two  eminent  citizens  of 
Burlington,  which  proved  of  lasting  pleas 
ure  and  service  to  me.  I  refer  to  Senator 
Edmunds  and  the  Honourable  E.  J.  Phelps, 
afterwards  Minister  to  Great  Britain.  They 
were  the  leading  lawyers  of  Vermont.  Sen 
ator  Edmunds  showed  in  his  long  public 
service  the  powers  of  a  great  statesman,  and 
to  the  great  regret  of  the  nation  withdrew 
too  early  from  official  life.  Mr.  Phelps 
was  one  of  the  most  brilliant  minds  whom 
it  has  been  my  fortune  to  know.  Un 
happily  during  most  of  his  life  he  was  on 
[126] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

the  wrong  side  in  politics  to  be  called  into 
public  service.  They  both  lent  a  charm  to 
social  life  in  Burlington,  which  makes  me 
look  back  on  it  as  a  good  fortune  to  have 
dwelt  there  with  them. 

Though  I  lived  in  Vermont  only  five 
years,  I  formed  a  wide  acquaintance  in  the 
State,  and  became  strongly  attached  to  the 
people.  They  were  an  agricultural  com 
munity  of  the  best  type.  Serious,  earnest, 
industrious,  frugal,  they  formed  their  opin 
ions  with  deliberation,  and  adhered  to  them 
firmly.  Their  moral  and  religious  ideals 
were  high.  The  sons  of  Vermont,  scattered 
far  and  wide  through  the  land,  reflect  great 
honour  upon  her. 

The  university  has  received  generous 
gifts  from  its  alumni  and  other  friends  and 
has  enjoyed  great  prosperity  under  Presi 
dent  Buckham.1 

1  He  died  November  29,  1910,  after  thirty-nine  years 
of  service  as  President.  He  has  been  succeeded  by  Dr. 
Guy  Potter  Benton. 


[127] 


VI 
THE  MISSION  TO  CHINA1 

ON  February  20,  1880,  I  received  a  letter 
from  Hon.  H.  P.  Baldwin,  a  Senator  from 
Michigan,  informing  me  that  Mr.  Evarts, 
Secretary  of  State,  desired  to  see  me  at  an 
early  date  in  Washington  on  a  matter  of 
public  interest.  It  occurred  to  me  as  pos 
sible  that  he  wished  me  to  take  a  place  on 
a  commission  to  consider  either  the  Fish 
eries  Question  or  the  Isthmian  Interoceanic 
Canal  Question. 

I  soon  went  to  Washington,  and  with 
Senator  Baldwin  called  on  the  Secretary 
by  appointment  at  his  house.  I  learned 
from  him  that  my  friend  Senator  Edmunds 
of  Vermont  had  some  months  before  di 
rected  his  attention  to  me  as  a  suitable 
person  for  diplomatic  service. 

The  Secretary  soon  made  it  known  to  me 
that  he  desired  me  to  go  to  China  as  one  of 

1  Though  I  went  from  Vermont  to  the  University  of 
Michigan  in  1870,  it  seems  most  convenient  to  defer  the 
narrative  of  my  life  in  Michigan  until  after  the  descrip 
tion  of  my  experience  in  public  life,  and  of  two  journeys 
to  Europe. 

[128] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

two  Commissioners  (the  other  to  be  a  Cali- 
fornian),  to  secure,  if  possible,  a  revision  of 
our  treaties  with  that  Empire,  especially 
with  the  purpose  of  restraining  in  some 
degree  the  emigration  which  was  threaten 
ing  to  flood  the  Pacific  States.  He  dwelt 
on  the  importance  of  adjusting  this  Asiatic 
life  to  ours  in  some  way  best  both  for  the 
Chinese  and  for  us.  His  manner  and  con 
versation  were  most  charming.  A  vein  of 
humour  ran  through  his  gravest  talk  like  a 
vein  of  silver  through  the  rock.  To  my 
inquiry  whether  he  had  any  reason  to  sup 
pose  the  Chinese  were  ready  to  accede  to 
his  propositions,  he  replied  that  General 
Grant  had,  in  his  interviews  with  high 
Chinese  officials,  received  the  impression 
that  they  were  ready  to  take  some  steps  in 
that  direction.  He  added  then  in  his 
inimitable  way,  "I  should  not  be  surprised 
if  the  Chinese  should  be  entirely  willing. 
They  may  well  say,  '  You  are  asking  us  to 
abide  by  our  own  doctrines.  We  always 
told  you  that  we  did  not  wish  to  open  so 
intimate  intercourse  with  you  western  na 
tions.  But  you  forced  us  at  the  cannon's 
mouth.  You  see  we  were  right.' '  Con 
tinuing,  he  said,  "Perhaps  we  had  better 
not  despise  a  government  which  for  thirty 
centuries  has  ruled  a  nation  now  numbering 
[129] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

three  hundred  millions,  while  we  have  only 
fifty  millions,  and  they  'run  us." 

At  the  proper  time  I  took  occasion  to  say 
that  I  thought  the  Consular  history  of 
Rome  was  rather  full  of  warnings  against 
the  policy  of  employing  a  commission  of 
two,  and  that  one  of  three  would  be  more 
likely  to  accomplish  a  result,  at  any  rate, 
to  avoid  an  even  decision.  Later,  Senator 
Edmunds  advanced  the  same  opinion,  and 
finally  a  Commission  of  three  was  decided  on. 

At  the  close  of  the  interview,  the  Secre 
tary  took  me  to  the  White  House  to  see 
President  Hayes.  He  seemed  deeply  im 
pressed  with  the  importance  of  restraining 
the  immigration  of  the  Chinese.  I  asked 
if  the  government  supposed  the  country 
east  of  the  Rocky  Mountains  was  ready  to 
adopt  measures  restrictive  of  Chinese  immi 
gration.  In  reply  I  was  given  to  under 
stand  that  the  action  of  such  a  Commission 
as  they  were  trying  to  appoint  would  of 
itself  have  much  weight  in  securing  ac 
quiescence  in  reasonable  measures. 

After  conference  with  Senators  Edmunds, 
Anthony,  Baldwin,  and  Ferry,  I  promised 
the  Secretary  that  I  would  return  home, 
give  the  subject  full  consideration,  consult 
the  Regents  of  the  University,  and  give  him 
answer  at  an  early  day. 
[130] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

On  March  11,  I  wrote  to  the  Secretary 
to  the  following  effect:  that  if  direct  and 
formal  prohibition  of  Chinese  immigration 
was  desired  I  preferred  that  some  one  else 
should  undertake  the  work,  but  that  if  cor 
rection  of  the  abuses  now  connected  with 
the  immigration  was  desired,  and  this  cor 
rection  should  work  as  a  restraint  on  the 
immigration,  I  was  willing  to  undertake  the 
task.  He  promptly  replied  that  there  was 
nothing  in  my  letter  incompatible  with  the 
purposes  of  the  President,  and  he  desired 
to  send  in  my  name  to  the  Senate  at  once. 
April  9, 1  was  confirmed  as  Minister  and  also 
as  Chairman  of  the  Commission  for  revising 
treaties  with  China.  John  F.  Swift  of  Cali 
fornia  and  William  H.  Trescot  of  South 
Carolina  were  appointed  Commissioners. 

On  April  1,  I  had  interesting  interviews 
in  Washington  with  Dr.  Peter  Parker, 
formerly  medical  missionary  at  Canton,  and 
with  George  Bancroft,  the  historian.  Both 
of  them  were  opposed  to  unlimited  immigra 
tion  of  the  Chinese.  Mr.  Bancroft  said  he 
did  not  want  to  see  the  young  men  in  Massa 
chusetts  towns  forced  to  compete  with  the 
Chinese  who  had  such  low  standards  of  liv 
ing.  He  was  also  not  without  fear  that  the 
South  might  employ  them  and  virtually 
reinstate  a  quasi-servitude. 
[131] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

On  May  26,  in  response  to  a  summons 
from  Mr.  Evarts,  I  reported  in  company 
with  Mr.  Trescot  at  his  office  in  the  expec 
tation  of  receiving  instructions.  We  had 
very  charming  interviews  with  him  on  four 
successive  days.  He  discoursed  at  length 
on  the  various  problems,  which  our  rela 
tions  with  China  have  forced  upon  us,  the 
difference  between  European  and  Asiatic 
immigration,  the  commercial  questions  in 
volved  in  the  Lekin  tax,  the  importance  of 
having  an  American  policy,  not  tied  to 
England,  the  expediency  of  dispersing  the 
Chinese  in  our  country,  the  importance  of 
impressing  the  Chinese  government  with 
our  desire  to  be  fair  and  even  generous  to 
wards  them,  and  the  question  whether  we 
can  modify  the  treaty  stipulations  con 
cerning  ex-territoriality.  All  this  did  not 
result  in  furnishing  us  any  specific  instruc 
tions  as  to  what  we  should  demand  in  a 
treaty.  But  the  Secretary  informed  us  that 
definite  instructions  would  overtake  us  on 
our  journey. 

On  June  4,  prominent  citizens  of  Detroit 
gave  a  dinner  in  my  honour.  The  Hon. 
George  V.  N.  Lothrop,  the  most  prominent 
member  of  the  Michigan  Bar,  afterwards 
our  Minister  to  Russia,  presided  with  his 
characteristic  grace.  I  would  gladly  have 
[132] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

been  excused  from  this  reception,  but  my 
friends  persuaded  me  that  it  would  be  help 
ful  to  the  University.  In  my  remarks  I 
carefully  refrained  from  discussing  the  ques 
tions  which  I  was  about  to  act  on  officially. 

On  the  next  day  at  4  P.M.,  the  Faculties 
and  the  students  gave  me  a  hearty  recep 
tion  in  University  Hall. 

On  June  6,  with  my  wife  and  daughter 
and  youngest  son,  I  started  for  San  Fran 
cisco  and  arrived  there  on  the  llth,  and 
remained  until  the  19th.  We  received 
many  hospitalities.  Mr.  Trescot  had 
reached  there  before  me  and  Mr.  Swift  re 
sided  there.  Especially  profitable  were  in 
terviews  with  the  Chinese  Consul  and  with 
Mr.  Low,  who  had  long  been  our  minister 
to  China.  Apparently  there  was  a  general 
feeling  that  the  coming  of  Chinese  labourers 
should  be  limited,  but  not  absolutely  for 
bidden.  One  representative  of  the  Labour 
Unions  asked  prohibition  of  immigration  in 
order  to  protect  American  mechanics.  I 
asked  him  if  he  could  name  one  mechanic 
who  had  been  crowded  out  of  employment 
by  the  Chinese,  and  he  confessed  he  could 
not. 

On  June  19,  we  sailed  on  the  "  Oceanic." 
In  the  voyage  of  eighteen  days  we  did  not, 
after  leaving  the  California  coast,  see  a 
[133] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

single  vessel  until  we  approached  the  coast 
of  Japan.  We  entered  the  harbour  of 
Yokohama  at  five  o'clock  in  the  morning. 
Before  the  steamer  had  stopped,  Japanese 
boats,  filled  with  half-naked  boatmen, 
swarmed  about  us  to  take  passengers  ashore. 
Hardly  had  we  dropped  anchor  before 
Lieutenant  Wainwright  (now  Admiral) 
came  on  board  to  learn  when  I  would  receive 
a  call  from  Admiral  Patterson,  who  was  in 
command  of  the  United  States  squadron  in 
the  harbour.  At  half-past  nine  he  and 
Captain  Johnson,  commanding  the  gun 
boat,  "Ashuelot "  called.  Under  orders  from 
our  government  they  were  waiting  to  take 
us  to  China  on  the  "  Richmond  "  and  the 
"Ashuelot."  As  on  our  arrival  they  were 
not  quite  ready  to  depart,  we  had  the  pleas 
ure  of  spending  ten  days  in  Yokohama  and 
Tokio. 

In  view  of  the  discussion  which  has  been 
carried  on  for  some  years  concerning  the 
expediency  of  erecting  houses  at  the  expense 
of  our  government  for  the  residences  of  our 
ministers  and  ambassadors,  it  may  not  be 
amiss  to  report  a  conversation  I  had  with 
Judge  Bingham,  our  minister  to  Japan  at  the 
time  of  my  visit.  Observing  that  he  was 
living  in  a  comfortable  though  modest 
house,  I  asked  him  if  he  had  built  it  at  his 
[134] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

own  expense.  He  said,  "Oh,  no.  As  we 
have  ex-territoriality  here,  I  was  obliged  to 
ask  for  an  appropriation  for  a  jail.  I  asked 
my  old  friends  in  Congress  for  an  appro 
priation  so  liberal  that  I  was  able  to  build 
my  house  as  an  annex  to  the  jail."  He  then 
took  me  to  the  rear  of  the  house  and  showed 
me  a  prisoner  confined  in  the  room  which 
was  the  jail. 

Judge  Bingham  prided  himself  on  having 
broken  away  from  blindly  following  Eng 
land,  as  most  of  the  other  ministers  had. 
He  said  he  had  seen  Sir  Harry  Parkes,  the 
British  minister  shake  his  fist  under  the 
nose  of  the  minister  of  Foreign  Affairs.  He 
added  that  the  forcible  withdrawal  of  a 
German  vessel  from  quarantine  was  really 
stimulated  by  the  Englishman. 

On  July  19,  my  family  and  I  embarked  on 
the  United  States  gunboat  "Ashuelot,"  Cap 
tain  Johnson,  for  Shanghai.  We  stopped  at 
Kobe  and  visited  the  old  capital,  Kioto. 
The  Italian  ship  of  war,  "  Vettor  Pisani," 
under  command  of  the  Duke  of  Genoa, 
was  at  Kobe.  We  exchanged  calls  with  him 
and  found  him  very  cordial  and  simple  in 
his  manners.  He  preferred  to  be  addressed 
simply  as  Captain.  The  sail  through  the 
Inland  Sea  was  charming.  It  reminded  one 
of  Lake  Champlain  and  Lake  George. 
[135] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

We  arrived  at  Shanghai  on  July  27,  and 
were  the  guests  of  Consul-General  Denny. 
I  was  told  that  Rev.  Dr.  Yates,  an  American 
missionary  of  the  Southern  Baptist  Society, 
knew  the  Chinamen  better  than  any  other 
foreigner  in  the  city.  I  therefore  asked 
him  for  a  description  of  the  Chinaman.  He 
said  he  had  studied  the  Chinaman  many 
years.  At  times  he  flattered  himself  that 
he  had  come  to  understand  thoroughly  the 
Chinaman's  nature  to  the  very  bottom. 
But  just  as  he  began  to  inflate  himself  with 
complacency  at  his  achievement,  some  new 
depth  in  the  Chinaman's  nature  yawned 
below  him.  About  the  only  thing,  he  said, 
that  you  can  be  sure  of  when  you  ask  him 
for  the  grounds  of  his  beliefs  is  that  the 
reasons  he  gives  you  are  not  the  real  ones. 

On  August  1,  we  reached  Chefoo.  Mr. 
Swift  and  Mr.  Trescot  had  arrived  on  the 
"Richmond."  It  was  thought  best  that  I 
should  go  on  in  advance  to  Peking  and  ar 
range  for  our  negotiations,  while  my  col 
leagues  and  my  family  remained  in  Chefoo. 
The  Admiral  took  me  on  the  "  Richmond  " 
to  Taku,  as  far  as  a  vessel  with  her  draught 
could  go.  The  "  Ashuelot "  then  took  me  to 
Tientsin,  where  we  arrived  on  August  3. 

The  next  day  at  4  P.M.,  accompanied  by 
Mr.  Holcomb,  Secretary  of  Legation,  and 

risei 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

six  naval  officers,  I  went  to  call  on  the 
Viceroy  Li  Hung  Chang,  at  his  residence. 
He  received  us  very  cordially  and  frequently 
took  occasion  to  express  his  friendship  for 
the  United  States.  He  was  very  anxious 
to  know  why  General  Grant  had  not  been 
nominated  again  in  June.  I  mentioned 
three  reasons,  one  of  which  was  that  there 
was  a  strong  feeling  against  a  third  term. 
This  he  could  not  understand,  repeatedly 
affirming  that  a  man  who  had  served  twice 
was  thereby  better  fitted  for  the  place. 

On  the  following  day  Li  came  with  a  large 
retinue  to  the  "  Ashuelot "  to  return  my  call. 
He  remained  an  hour  and  a  half  and  seemed 
in  fine  spirits.  He  talked  on  several  subjects 
and  joked  freely.  He  repeated  a  remark 
which  I  had  made  to  him  on  the  previous 
day  that  the  Brazilians  who  were  trying 
to  make  a  treaty  to  secure  coolies  should 
make  a  draft  on  us  who  were  trying  to 
restrict  the  immigration.  He  told  me  in  a 
whisper  that  although  the  complications 
with  Russia  on  the  Kuldja  question  were 
serious,  he  believed  China  would  escape 
war.  He  said  the  idiots  at  Peking  had 
dreadfully  blundered,  that  Tso  (the  Chinese 
general  in  Kuldja)  was  a  braggart,  and  that 
he  was  now  under  strict  orders  not  to  pro 
voke  war  with  the  Russians. 
[137] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Much  to  my  gratification,  Li  had  brought 
General  Gordon  with  him.  The  General 
had  come  to  China  to  persuade  the  govern 
ment  to  keep  out  of  a  war  with  Russia. 
He  was  living  by  himself  in  a  Buddhist 
temple,  and  I  was  told  that  he  remained  at 
his  devotions  until  ten  o'clock,  so  that  be 
fore  that  hour  he  refused  all  callers.  Hav 
ing  heard  of  his  military  achievements,  I 
had  fancied  him  to  be  a  big  English  "swash 
buckler."  Judge  of  my  surprise  when  a 
man  of  small  stature,  with  a  low  and  sweet 
voice,  with  a  manner  almost  feminine  in 
delicacy,  quietly  seated  himself  close  to  me 
and  told  me  his  story.  He  said  he  had  come 
to  persuade  China  to  refrain  from  war,  from 
wasting  her  money  on  ironclads,  the  or 
ganization  of  a  great  army  on  the  European 
plan,  and  from  a  foreign  debt.  He  said 
that  the  true  defence  for  them  is  howitzers, 
fleet  ships  and  a  sort  of  guerilla  warfare. 
Their  soldiers  need  no  tents,  and  no  com 
missary  department.  The  way  for  them  to 
fight  the  Russians  is  to  attack  them  at  night, 
allowing  them  no  sleep,  and  then  hasten 
away  till  the  next  night.  They  can  thus 
keep  them  on  the  run  and  tire  them  out. 
He  tells  them  their  capital  is  too  near 
Siberia  and  too  near  the  sea.  It  can  always 
be  easily  captured.  He  was  there  with  the 
[138] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

British  forces  in  1858-60,  and  knows  the 
region  thoroughly.  He  besought  me  to 
impress  these  ideas  of  peace  on  Li,  as  I  had 
opportunity.  He  had  come  to  meet  me 
for  the  purpose  of  making  this  request. 

The  British  government  soon  recalled  him, 
because,  it  was  reported,  they  were  afraid 
Russia  would  take  offense  at  his  action. 

Li  invited  me  to  dine  with  him  on  my 
return  from  Peking  and  placed  at  my  dis 
posal  his  steam  launch  to  take  me  twenty- 
five  miles  up  the  river. 

I  availed  myself  of  his  offer,  and  after 
leaving  the  launch  went  by  houseboats, 
drawn  by  men  to  Tungcho  and  thence  by 
canal  to  Peking.  Mr.  Seward,  the  minister, 
received  me  at  the  Legation,  and  in  due 
time  introduced  me  to  the  Tsung-li-Yamen, 
and  presented  his  recall.  Prince  Kung  im 
pressed  me  as  far  superior  to  the  other  mem 
bers  of  the  Foreign  Office.  They  returned 
my  call,  and  as  they  were  passing  through 
the  drawing  room,  some  one  struck  the  keys 
of  the  piano.  They  hastened  with  a  child 
like  curiosity  to  look  in  under  the  cover  of 
the  instrument  to  ascertain  what  caused 
the  sound.  Prince  Kung  announced  the 
appointment  of  two  commissioners  to  ne 
gotiate  with  us  and  assured  me  they  would 
proceed  with  despatch. 
[139] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

The  European  ministers  generally  were 
in  expectation  of  war  with  Russia.  Under 
the  walls  of  the  city  the  soldiers  were  pre 
paring  by  practice  to  meet  the  Russian 
army.  This  practice  consisted  of  firing  at 
a  target  with  bows  and  arrows. 

The  Tsung-li-Yamen  having  learned  that 
the  Brazilian  ministers  were  approaching 
to  make  a  treaty,  asked  the  American 
Secretary  where  Brazil  was,  and  if  it  was  a 
country  of  much  consequence. 

Having  in  two  weeks  completed  my  busi 
ness  in  Peking,  I  returned  to  Chefoo.  My 
colleagues  and  I  and  our  families  at  once 
set  out  for  Tientsin  in  the  gunboats  "  Mo- 
nocacy  "  and  "  Ashuelot."  We  exchanged 
calls  with  Li  and  hurried  on  to  Peking. 

On  the  journey  up  the  river  I  had  an  in 
teresting  conversation  with  Mr.  Trescot, 
concerning  an  event  in  the  Civil  War.  After 
this  lapse  of  time,  I  think  I  may  be  allowed 
to  report  it.  In  the  American  Case  for  the 
Geneva  Arbitration  of  the  so-called  Ala 
bama  Claims,  I  had  read  that  the  British 
government,  through  Lord  Lyons,  the  Brit 
ish  Minister  at  Washington,  invited  our 
government  to  sign  the  Declaration  of 
Paris  (of  1856),  and  informed  the  Con 
federate  government  of  this  action.  At 
the  same  time  they  invited  the  Confederate 
[140] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

government  to  sign  the  second  and  third 
Articles  and  to  omit  the  first,  which  forbids 
privateering,  but  did  not  inform  our  gov 
ernment  of  this  action.  Moreover,  they 
sent  the  message  to  Richmond  and  Charles 
ton,  through  Lord  Lyons.  If  this  plan  had 
succeeded  the  South  could  have  commis 
sioned  privateers,  while  we  should  have 
been  precluded,  and  the  carrying  trade  for 
both  belligerents  would  have  been  secured  to 
Great  Britain.  This  was  so  dishonourable 
a  trick,  that  I  had  always  been  reluctant 
to  believe  it.  As  Mr.  Trescot  was  em 
ployed  in  our  State  Department  at  the  time, 
and  was  also  very  familiar  with  transactions 
in  the  South,  I  ventured  to  express  my 
doubts  of  the  accuracy  of  the  statement  in 
the  American  Case.  He  replied,  "You  may 
well  believe  it,  for  I  myself  took  the  despatch 
from  Lord  Lyons  to  Richmond." 

At  the  first  meeting  of  the  Commissioners 
with  the  Tsung-li-Yamen,  we  were  informed 
that  two  Commissioners  had  been  appointed 
to  negotiate  with  us,  Pao  Chun,  an  aged 
member  of  the  body  with  an  excellent  repu 
tation  for  honesty,  and  Li  Hung  Tsao,  one 
of  the  most  noted  historical  scholars. 

It  will  be  understood  that  I  held  two 
Commissions,  one  as  Minister  Plenipoten 
tiary  and  one  as  Commissioner  to  negotiate 
[141] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

treaties.  Therefore  I  had  in  hand  the  regu 
lar  business  of  the  Legation  as  well  as  work 
on  the  Treaties. 

When  we  American  Commissioners  met 
to  draft  a  paper  to  present  to  the  Chinese 
Commissioner,  there  was  a  sharp  difference 
of  opinion  between  Mr.  Swift  on  the  one 
side  and  Mr.  Trescot  and  myself  on  the 
other.  Mr.  Swift  wished  that  we  should 
demand  the  absolute  prohibition  of  the 
immigration  of  labourers.  Mr.  Trescot  and 
I  maintained  that  we  should  ask  merely  for 
a  stipulation  giving  us  power  to  regulate, 
but  not  to  forbid,  absolutely,  immigration. 
Mr.  Swift  asked  that  we  telegraph  to  Mr. 
Evarts  for  authority  to  present  his  demand. 
We  declined  to  do  so.  Mr.  Swift  of  course 
yielded,  but  not  without  some  feeling.  We 
allowed  him  to  spread  on  the  record  his 
propositions  and  his  protest  against  ours. 

When  we  read  our  statement  to  the 
Chinese,  Pao  said  there  were  some  diffi 
culties  on  both  sides,  but  he  thought  there 
were  none  which  might  not  be  adjusted. 

After  two  or  three  meetings  the  details 
of  which  I  will  not  give,  we  found  one  day 
to  our  surprise  the  whole  Yamen  in  attend 
ance.  They  had  brought  a  full  pro  jet  for  a 
treaty,  containing  provisions  that  any  re 
striction  in  immigration  should  apply  to 
[142] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

California  alone,  that  artisans  should  not 
be  excluded,  that  there  should  be  no  punish 
ment  for  labourers  coming  in  violation  of  the 
treaty,  and  allowing  persons,  not  Americans, 
to  import  and  employ  Chinese  labourers. 
We  did  not  encourage  them  to  suppose  we 
could  accept  their  draft,  but  took  it  away 
for  consideration. 

Two  days  later  we  had  a  most  anxious, 
and,  as  it  proved,  a  decisive  session  with  the 
Chinese.  We  took  up  the  first  Article  in 
their  draft  and  the  first  in  ours,  regulating 
immigration,  and  found  ourselves  so  at  vari 
ance  with  them,  that  Mr.  Swift  declared 
they  did  not  mean  to  give  us  a  treaty,  and 
Mr.  Trescot,  usually  hopeful,  thought  we 
had  come  to  the  end,  and  that  we  had  better 
state  our  ultimatum  and  go.  But  I  saw 
the  Chinese  earnestly  discussing  and  I  sug 
gested  patience,  saying  that  we  might  well 
spend  an  hour  there,  that  perhaps  never 
would  our  time  be  more  valuable.  Let  us 
leave  this  Article,  I  advised,  and  take  up  the 
last.  Let  the  fish  chew  the  bait  awhile. 
The  last  Article  was  one  which  provided 
that  no  laws  we  should  pass  in  respect  to 
immigration  should  be  operative  until  ap 
proved  by  them.  This  was  so  unreason 
able  that  they  soon  said  they  would  waive 
that.  Then  we  took  up  the  Article  in 
[143] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

which  they  seemed  to  us  to  ask  that  Chinese 
students  and  merchants  could  take  with 
them  employees.  They  explained  that  they 
meant  by  that  only  household  servants. 
To  that  we  had  no  objection.  Having  now 
got  into  the  mood  of  agreeing,  we  went 
back  to  Article  I.  I  pointed  out  to  them 
that  this  clause  asking  that  no  limitation 
should  be  excessively  great  or  excessively 
long  was  inappropriate  to  a  treaty,  and 
would  only  cause  discussion  instead  of 
hindering  it.  They  consented  to  change 
that.  As  to  their  clause  about  penalties 
they  said  they  only  wished  to  guard  against 
personal  abuse  and  maltreatment.  We 
agreed  to  guard  against  this.  We  thus  paved 
the  way  for  dove-tailing  their  first  Article 
and  ours  together,  and  the  work  was  done. 
It  was  agreed  that  Mr.  Holcombe,  the 
Secretary,  should  come  the  next  day  and 
with  them  arrange  the  texts. 

Greatly  relieved,  we  were  about  to  leave, 
when  Pao  detained  us.  He  said  he  wished 
to  speak  of  one  thing  more.  When  the 
Chinese  treaties  with  the  Western  Powers 
were  made,  they  were  one-sided.  Now  as 
they  wished  to  push  new  trade  abroad,  they 
desired  to  secure  equal  commercial  privi 
leges.  As  the  United  States  had  always 
been  their  friend,  they  preferred  to  begin 
[144] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

with  us,  and  they  wished  to  know  if  we 
could  consider  a  proposition  for  a  treaty  or 
an  article  in  this  treaty  on  that  point.  We 
cordially  responded  that  we  would  take  the 
matter  into  friendly  and  sympathetic  con 
sideration. 

Apparently  the  Chinese  intended  to  give 
us  the  treaty  we  had  made,  but  to  concede 
us  as  little  as  possible.  We  completed  the 
final  agreement  on  the  Immigration  Treaty 
at  3  P.M.,  November  8. 

We  then  left  with  them  our  draft  of  a 
Commercial  Treaty.  In  it  the  two  nations 
agree  to  favour  the  extension  of  commerce 
with  each  other,  to  fix  the  rate  of  tonnage 
dues  and  import  duties  on  the  same  scale  for 
both  nations,  to  prohibit  the  trade  in  opium 
between  them,  and  to  provide  for  the  trial 
of  a  person  in  the  court  of  his  nationality. 
We  had  reason  to  believe  that  the  dues  and 
duties  for  Chinese  vessels  entering  Chinese 
ports  were  less  than  for  our  vessels.  The 
request  for  the  opium  Article  originated 
with  Li  Hung  Chang.  We  were  very  will 
ing  to  adopt  it,  though  Mr.  Trescot  had 
fears  that  we  might  be  criticized  for  it  as  we 
had  no  instructions  on  the  subject.  But  I 
believed  that  it  would  meet  with  favour  at 
home,  though  it  might  be  criticized  in 
England. 

11  [  145  ] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

After  the  agreement  on  the  treaties,  the 
Chinese  Commissioners  sent  presents  to  us, 
consisting  of  ham,  sausages,  fruits,  chest 
nuts,  and  cakes  for  which  the  messengers, 
bringing  them,  expected  and  received  suit 
able  fees. 

There  was  an  interesting  incident  con 
nected  with  the  signing  of  the  treaties.  We 
had  fixed  on  a  day  for  signing  them.  When 
we  arrived  at  the  Yamen,  the  Commission 
ers  with  an  air  of  great  mortification  an 
nounced  that  they  could  not  sign  on  that 
day,  that  it  was  the  Emperor's  birthday, 
on  which  they  could  sign  no  document 
containing  a  word  of  unhappy  significance, 
that  such  a  word  occurred  in  the  treaties, 
and  that  in  making  the  appointment  they 
had  not  remembered  that  it  was  the  Em 
peror's  birthday,  and  they  therefore  asked 
for  another  date  for  the  signing.  Of  course 
we  assented,  and  on  November  17  we  all 
signed. 

The  European  ministers  were  astonished 
when  we  informed  them  that  after  forty- 
eight  days  of  negotiations,  we  had  secured 
two  treaties.  On  my  arrival  at  Peking, 
Mr.  Von  Brandt,  the  German  Minister, 
perhaps  the  ablest  foreign  representative 
there,  told  me  that  after  two  years  of  labour 
he  had  just  procured  a  treaty  and  that  I 
[146] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

must  not  hope  to  finish  a  negotiation  under 
a  year.  I  have  always  supposed  that  what 
ever  influence  Sir  Robert  Hart  had  with 
the  Chinese  authorities  was  used  to  our 
advantage.  I  saw  no  evidence  that  any 
of  the  foreign  powers  made  any  effort  to 
hinder  us,  though  reports  to  the  effect  that 
some  of  them  did  were  more  or  less  current. 
My  personal  relations  with  all  the  Ministers 
were  most  cordial. 

One  of  the  most  serious  embarrassments 
of  the  Commission  was  due  to  what  must 
be  considered  an  error  of  the  State  Depart 
ment  in  appointing  my  colleagues  Commis 
sioners  Plenipotentiary,  instead  of  Envoys 
or  Ministers  Extraordinary.  The  former 
title  was  unknown  to  our  naval  officers  and 
to  European  diplomats.  So  there  was 
trouble  with  the  naval  officers  in  respect  to 
salutes  and  it  required  great  care  to  avoid 
unpleasant  complications  in  the  social  rela 
tions  at  Peking. 

After  the  departure  of  my  colleagues  on 
the  Commission  in  the  early  winter,  my 
duties  were  those  of  the  Minister.  A  few 
incidents  may  be  worthy  of  mention,  es 
pecially  as  illustrating  the  good  dispo 
sition  of  the  Tsung-li-Yamen. 

As  each  village  holds  certain  religious 
festivals  annually,  under  Chinese  usage, 
[147] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

every  village  was  taxed  to  meet  the  ex 
penses  of  the  festivals.  The  Christian 
converts  were  embarrassed  by  this  re 
quirement,  as  some  of  the  features  of  the 
ceremonies  were  incompatible  with  the 
Christian  faith.  The  Roman  Catholics 
had  some  years  before  my  coming  procured 
the  exemption  of  their  converts  from  assess 
ments  for  the  festivals.  When  I  learned 
this,  I  asked  for  the  exemption  of  the  Protes 
tant  Christians.  The  request  was  received 
with  great  courtesy,  and  soon  an  Imperial 
Decree  was  issued,  relieving  the  Protestant 
natives  from  the  assessment. 

At  an  auction  sale  of  the  goods  of  a  Pres 
byterian  missionary  who  was  about  to 
leave  Peking  for  America  on  a  visit,  some 
rude  fellows  in  the  crowd  which  an  auction 
always  attracts  there,  threw  missiles  into 
the  grounds,  broke  down  shrubbery,  and 
caused  much  disturbance.  When  the  news 
reached  me  that  the  disturbance  was  going 
on  and  threatening  to  become  more  seri 
ous,  I  sent  a  message  to  the  Yamen,  asking 
for  protection  to  the  mission.  They  at  once 
sent  a  detachment  of  soldiers  and  arrested 
the  mischief  makers,  and  when  I  went  to 
the  mission  on  the  next  morning,  I  saw  two 
or  three  of  the  men  arrested,  sitting  in  the 
street  by  the  gateway  of  the  mission,  with 
[148] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

cangues  on  their  necks.  The  authorities 
offered  to  furnish  an  armed  escort  for  the 
missionary  on  his  journey  out  of  the  city, 
but  I  declined  this  as  unnecessary.  The 
local  official  who  should  have  prevented 
the  disorder  was  at  once  discharged,  and 
he  appealed  to  me  to  interpose  for  his  re- 
appointment.  Our  local  authorities  have 
not  always  been  so  efficient  in  protecting 
Chinamen  in  our  cities. 

When  Mr.  Elaine  was  Secretary  of  State, 
a  rumour  reached  him  that  the  Chinese 
government  was  cherishing  a  plan  to  seize 
the  Hawaiian  Islands.  He  sent  me  a  very 
spirited  despatch,  instructing  me  to  call  the 
attention  of  the  Yamen  to  this  report  and 
warn  them  that  our  government  would  not 
permit  such  an  act.  No  one  in  Peking 
attached  any  importance  to  the  rumour.  I 
presented  Mr.  Elaine's  statement  with  all 
seriousness.  It  was  difficult  to  make  Chi 
nese  ministers  comprehend  the  gist  of  my 
inquiry  about  their  intention  to  acquire  the 
Islands.  But  when  they  did,  they  burst 
into  a  roar  of  laughter,  and  begged  me  to 
inform  the  Secretary  that  whenever  they 
formed  such  a  plan  they  would  give  the 
United  States  timely  notice. 

The  Japanese  Minister,  Mr.  Shishido, 
who  had  more  than  once  confided  to  me  his 
[149] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

troubles  in  doing  business  with  the  Chinese 
government,  one  day  came  to  me,  appar 
ently  much  depressed  in  spirits,  and  said 
that  he  wished  in  confidence  to  lodge  a 
document  with  me.  The  Yamen,  he  said, 
had  made  a  treaty  with  him,  and  when  the 
day  on  which  they  had  agreed  to  sign  it 
arrived,  they  refused  to  sign.  He  had, 
therefore,  in  indignation  decided  to  leave 
for  home.  He  had  drawn  a  paper  reciting 
the  facts,  which  he  was  not  showing  to  the 
other  foreign  ministers.  But  his  nation 
felt  so  grateful  to  the  United  States  for  its 
kindness  and  especially  to  General  Grant 
for  his  wise  counsels  to  them  on  his  recent 
visit,  that  he  wished  to  leave  this  docu 
ment  in  our  hands. 

I  received  it  with  hearty  appreciation  of 
the  friendship  evinced  for  us,  and  especially 
for  the  gratitude  expressed  for  General 
Grant.  I  had  learned  so  much  in  Japan 
and  China  of  the  great  service  Grant  had 
tendered  to  both  nations,  that  this  tribute 
to  him  touched  me  with  pride.  He  had 
warned  them  to  keep  out  of  war,  especially 
with  each  other.  He  had  showed  them  how 
war  would  put  them  in  bondage  to  European 
creditors  and  how  they  should  unite  to 
effect  a  permanent  co-operation  in  taking 
their  places  among  the  great  self-reliant 
[150] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

powers  of  the  world.  I  had  come  to  feel 
that  his  services  to  those  two  nations  were 
second  in  value  only  to  his  services  to  his 
own  nation.  They  both  expressed  to  him 
their  desire  that  he  would  act  as  arbiter  in 
settling  their  trouble  about  the  ownership 
of  the  Loo  Choo  Islands.  He  declined,  tell 
ing  them,  as  he  often  did,  that  he  was  now 
only  a  private  citizen,  and  could  take  no 
office.  That  fact  they  all  came  to  under 
stand. 

Naturally  I  hastened  to  describe  the  ac 
tion  of  the  Japanese  Minister  to  the  State 
Department,  calling  special  attention  to 
what  he  said  of  General  Grant.  To  my 
great  surprise,  in  due  time  I  received  a 
reply  from  the  Secretary  of  State  calling 
my  attention  in  very  serious  tone  to  the 
fact  that  General  Grant  held  no  official 
post  when  he  was  in  the  East,  and  that  I 
should  not  have  neglected  my  opportunity 
to  make  that  known.  Why  the  honour 
paid  to  General  Grant  should  have  gratified 
the  Secretary  so  little,  I  leave  to  the  reader 
to  conjecture. 

I  was  interested  in  finding  that  some  of 
the  members  of  the  Tsung-li-Yamen  were 
as  keen  reasoners  in  a  discussion  as  one  will 
meet  anywhere.  Their  intellectual  train 
ing  had  been  purely  linguistic.  The  ques- 
[151] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

tion  often  suggested  itself  to  me,  whether 
this  fact  had  any  bearing  on  the  discussions 
we  so  often  have  as  to  the  value  of  our  old 
classical  training  in  preparing  men  for  pub 
lic  life.  These  keen  reasoners  were  almost 
absolutely  devoid  of  mathematical  or  sci 
entific  education.  I  sometimes  doubted 
whether  in  reaching  their  conclusions  they 
were  aware  as  we  are  of  taking  certain 
logical  steps.  If  they  were,  they  did  not 
make  known  the  steps  to  us,  but  at  once 
stated  their  conclusions.  There  was  only 
one  man  in  the  Tsung-li-Yamen  who  in 
discussion  with  me  gave  his  grounds,  one, 
two,  three,  for  his  opinion  as  we  do.  Much 
to  my  delight  he  and  I  worked  so  harmoni 
ously  that  they  left  him  to  do  most  of  the 
business  with  me.  His  mind  seemed  to  me 
to  work  like  the  mind  of  a  Western  man- 
by  logical  processes. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  members  of 
the  Tsung-li-Yamen  was  the  General  Tso 
Tsung  Tang,  of  whom  Li  Hung  Chang  had 
spoken  to  me  as  a  boaster.  Perhaps  he  was, 
but  he  was  entertaining.  He  talked  at  my 
table  of  his  campaigns  in  Kuldja  with  the 
dramatic  air  of  a  Frenchman.  It  was  re 
ported  that  he  was  appointed  to  the  Foreign 
Office  in  accordance  with  a  shrewd  Chinese 
custom  of  curing  a  critic  by  giving  him  re- 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

sponsibility.  It  was  related  that  when  he 
came  back  from  his  campaign  to  Peking,  he 
complained  to  the  authorities  that  too  great 
privileges  were  extended  to  the  foreign  lega 
tions,  particularly  that  the  French  legation 
were  allowed  by  the  Yamen  to  enclose  too 
large  a  part  of  the  street  in  their  yard.  He 
was  at  once  appointed  as  a  member  of  the 
Board.  It  soon  appeared  that  he  enjoyed 
the  society  of  us  foreigners,  who  listened 
with  interest  to  his  conversation,  and  that 
no  one  cherished  a  more  liberal  spirit  to  us 
than  he  did. 

When  the  Russian  Czar  was  assassinated, 
he  inquired  who  killed  him.  When  told 
that  it  was  the  deed  of  Nihilists,  he  asked 
who  they  were.  When  informed  that  they 
were  a  secret  society,  pledged  to  kill  sov 
ereigns,  he  said,  "Secret  societies!  they 
ought  to  make  short  work  with  them. 
A  few  years  ago  the  province  of  Fuhkien 
was  honeycombed  with  secret  societies,  and 
in  their  conflicts  with  each  other  they  were 
destroying  villages.  The  government  sent 
me  down  there  to  restore  peace.  In  about 
six  weeks  I  had  perfect  tranquillity." 

"Well,  your  Excellency,"  he  was  asked, 

"how  did  you  accomplish  that?"     "Why, 

in  two  weeks  I  cut  off  the  heads  of  about 

three  thousand  men,  and  it  was  perfectly 

[153] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

quiet  after  that."  And  he  spoke  of  it  as 
calmly,  as  though  he  were  talking  of  killing 
so  many  flies. 

A  business  meeting  with  the  Yamen  was 
always,  in  theory,  a  social  meeting.  Refresh 
ments  were  invariably  served,  and  it  was 
vain  to  attempt  to  engage  their  attention  to 
a  matter  of  business  until  the  refreshments 
were  disposed  of.  It  would  seem  that  this 
usage  was  calculated  to  bring  men  to  their 
conference  in  an  amicable  frame. 

Sir  Thomas  Wade,  the  British  Minister, 
was  a  most  genial  gentleman,  with  a  large 
fund  of  Irish  wit.  As  his  family  were  in 
England  during  our  residence  in  Peking,  he 
was  kind  enough  to  be  much  in  our  house 
and  contributed  immensely  to  our  pleasure. 
He  had  a  great  fund  of  stories.  One  he 
told  on  D 'Israeli  and  Gladstone  is  perhaps 
worth  repeating.  D 'Israeli  once  said  to  a 
friend  in  conversation  that  the  English 
artists  lacked  imagination.  Within  an  hour 
he  had  occasion  to  address  a  society  of  Eng 
lish  painters  and  declared  that  they  excelled 
in  imaginative  powers.  Gladstone  being 
told  of  this  said  he  could  see  how  in  the 
fervour  of  debate  one  might  say  such  a 
thing,  but  how  one  could  do  it  in  such 
circumstances  he  could  not  see.  "It  is 
hellish,"  he  exclaimed. 
[154] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

Sir  Thomas  was  a  superior  Chinese 
scholar.  He  wrote  the  text  book  which 
most  students  used  in  learning  the  language, 
and  was  fond  of  talking  about  the  language. 
He  said  there  is  great  difficulty  in  reducing 
the  grammar  to  our  categories.  The  Chi 
nese  do  not  seek  classification  of  parts  of 
speech  but  are  content  to  follow  precedent 
and  usage.  Exactness  is  attainable  in  the 
expression  of  thought  in  it,  though  its 
machinery  for  mode  and  tense  is  clumsy. 
It  has  changed  but  little  in  five  thousand 
years. 

It  is  sometimes  remarked  in  diplomatic 
circles  that  a  minister  may  become  in  a 
measure  disqualified  for  his  duties  by  too 
long  service  at  one  post.  He  comes  to  look 
at  questions  from  the  point  of  view  of  the 
people  with  whom  he  has  long  dwelt.  It 
was  charged  that  Sir  Thomas  often  in 
stinctively  took  the  Chinaman's  view  of  a 
controversy  between  England  and  China, 
and  so  failed  to  satisfy  the  British  Foreign 
Office. 

I  have  heard  that  once  when  President 
Grant  was  asked  to  appoint  as  our  minis 
ter  at  Peking  a  gentleman  who  had  spent 
most  of  his  life  in  China,  he  replied  that  he 
had  but  one  objection,  namely,  that  he  did 
not  wish  to  appoint  a  Chinaman. 
[155] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

My  intimate  acquaintance  with  Sir  Rob 
ert  Hart,  the  head  of  the  Imperial  Customs, 
was  of  great  help  to  me  and  the  source  of 
great  pleasure.  He,  like  Sir  Thomas,  was 
of  Irish  birth.  He  was  a  graduate  of  the 
University  of  Belfast,  and  a  fine  classical 
scholar.  He  kept  up  his  reading  of  Greek 
and  Latin  in  the  midst  of  all  his  official 
cares.  He  was,  of  course,  a  great  Chinese 
scholar.  His  advice  to  the  government  was 
supposed  to  be  of  great  weight,  as  it  de 
served  to  be. 

He  told  me,  however,  that  one  of  his 
chief  obstacles  was  the  conservatism  and 
stupidity  of  some  of  the  mandarins  with 
whom  he  had  to  do.  For  his  diversion  he 
played  on  the  violin.  He  said  that  some  of 
the  mandarins  declared  that  he  was  paid  a 
large  salary  for  sitting  all  day  on  his  divan 
and  fiddling. 

The  government  had  founded  a  college 
for  the  training  of  young  Chinese  to  enter 
into  the  diplomatic  service.  The  American 
missionary,  Rev.  Dr.  Martin,  was  the 
President.  During  his  temporary  absence, 
Mr.  Hart  was  put  in  charge.  He  asked  me 
to  visit  the  college  from  time  to  time  and 
report  to  him  what  I  found.  The  Profes 
sors  were  Europeans,  who  were  teaching 
English,  French,  and  Russian  and  branches 
[156] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

of  Western  learning.  They  told  me  that 
the  students  were  so  afraid  of  being  sup 
posed  to  have  any  connection  with  for 
eigners,  that  they  would  not  recognize  them 
on  the  streets.  The  students  were  granted 
an  allowance  like  our  students  at  Annapolis 
and  West  Point.  Mr.  Hart  wittily  de 
scribed  them  as  the  sons  of  mandarins  who 
allowed  their  offspring  for  a  consideration  to 
be  defiled  with  the  pitch  of  Western  learning. 

Mr.  Hart  told  me  that  he  came  near 
joining  the  Tai-pings  in  their  great  rebel 
lion  in  1859,  and  that  he  believed  they  would 
have  succeeded  if  the  foreigners  had  not 
joined  the  government  in  opposing  them 
and  that  they  would  probably  have  given  as 
good  a  government  as  that  which  prevailed. 

He  placed  great  stress  on  the  filial  respect 
and  reverence  of  the  Chinese,  saying  Provi 
dence  had  fulfilled  the  divine  promise  of 
length  of  days  to  the  nation  which  obeyed 
the  command  to  honour  the  fathers. 

He  talked  frankly  to  me  of  some  of  their 
serious  faults  and  of  their  antipathy  to 
foreigners,  and  as  if  foreseeing  what  actually 
befell  his  own  house  in  the  Boxer  troubles, 
said  "None  of  us  know  how  soon  in  some 
excitement  our  houses  may  all  be  in  flames." 

The  most  brilliant  minister  at  Peking 
was  Von  Brandt,  the  German.  He  was  the 
[157] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

son  of  General  Von  Brandt,  distinguished 
in  the  war  of  German  Independence  against 
Napoleon.  He  had  served  several  years  in 
Japan,  and  understood  the  Oriental  mind 
thoroughly,  and  had  the  means  of  getting 
access  to  the  secrets  of  the  Chinese  govern 
ment.  As  the  legations  acted  together  on 
matters  of  common  interest,  he  was  of  great 
service  to  us.  His  diplomatic  career  was 
terminated  in  a  very  romantic  manner.  He 
chose  to  marry  a  very  accomplished  Ameri 
can  lady.  At  that  time,  it  was  not  per 
mitted  to  German  diplomats  to  marry 
ladies  not  of  their  own  nationality. 

Two  young  men  whose  names  afterwards 
became  widely  known  were  at  that  time  in 
the  German  legation.  One  was  Count 
Tattenbach,  a  member  of  a  very  old  Ba 
varian  family,  who  won  distinction  by 
representing  his  country  in  the  Morocco 
troubles  and  also  by  being  Governor  of 
Alsace-Lorraine.  The  other  was  Baron 
Von  Ketteler,  whose  bravery  in  attempting 
to  leave  Peking  in  the  Boxer  troubles  caused 
his  murder  on  the  principal  street  of  the 
city,  at  the  spot  now  marked  by  an  impos 
ing  monument  erected  by  the  Chinese 
government. 

Although  I  had  found  my  diplomatic 
labours  attractive  in  many  respects,  and 
[158] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

should  perhaps  have  been  disposed  to  con 
tinue  in  the  service  if  ministers  could  have 
counted  on  a  permanent  tenure,  I  decided 
to  return  to  my  academic  duties  and  there 
fore  asked  the  President  to  accept  my  resig 
nation. 

On  October  4,  we  bade  adieu  to  Peking. 
A  considerable  number  of  our  diplomatic 
and  missionary  friends  gathered  at  our  resi 
dence  to  say  good-bye,  and  several  rode  out 
a  few  miles  with  us  on  our  road  to  Tungcho. 
The  life  at  Peking  in  our  time  was  so  remote 
from  the  rest  of  the  world  that  the  friend 
ships  formed  there  were  very  close.  It  was 
not  without  deep  emotion  that  we  parted 
from  those  whose  society  had  been  so  dear 
to  us. 

On  arriving  at  Tientsin,  I  called  on  the 
Viceroy,  Li  Hung  Chang.  He  received  me 
most  affably,  and  thanked  me  very  warmly 
for  my  part  in  making  the  Opium  Treaty. 
I  thought  the  opportunity  favourable  for 
telling  him  some  plain  truth.  I  ventured  to 
say  that  I  thought  that  he  could  carry  Eng 
land  for  the  anti-opium  doctrine  in  five 
years  on  one  condition,  namely,  that  the 
Chinese  officials  should  in  at  least  five 
provinces  take  hold  of  the  work  of  suppress 
ing  the  growth  of  the  poppy  with  vigour. 
I  assured  him  that  the  English  maintain 
[159] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

that  the  Chinese  wish  to  stop  the  importing 
of  opium  merely  to  raise  it  themselves  and 
tax  it  for  revenue.  I  do  not  think  he  en 
joyed  my  remarks.  He  assured  me  that 
in  five  provinces  (Chi-li  being  one)  the 
growth  was  already  controlled.  It  was  not 
courteous  for  me  to  question  his  statement ; 
but  there  was  abundant  evidence  that 
much  was  growing  in  Chi-li  at  that 
moment. 

I  expressed  the  regret  of  my  government 
at  the  recall  of  the  Chinese  students  from 
America,  which  had  just  taken  place.  He 
appeared  also  to  regret  it. 

He  courteously  expressed  the  desire  that 
I  should  return  to  my  post. 

I  attended  the  opening  of  a  hospital 
under  very  interesting  circumstances.  Miss 
Howard,  a  medical  missionary,  who  had 
graduated  at  the  University  of  Michigan, 
had  been  assigned  to  duty  at  Tientsin.  She 
was  called  to  render  professional  services  to 
the  wife  of  the  Viceroy,  and  had  been  the 
means  of  restoring  her  to  health.  To  show 
his  gratitude  the  Viceroy  made  a  generous 
contribution  to  found  a  hospital  and  in 
duced  his  subordinate  officials  to  contribute 
also.  On  its  completion  Miss  Howard  fixed 
a  day  for  the  opening,  when  I  could  be  pres 
ent  and  make  an  address.  The  Viceroy  and 
[160] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

other  high  Chinese  officials  and  the  foreign 
Consuls  were  present.  The  Viceroy  made 
very  kind  and  complimentary  remarks 
about  Miss  Howard.  In  my  address  I  of 
course  made  proper  recognition  of  his  gen 
erous  interest  in  the  hospital.  It  has  been 
of  great  service  to  sufferers.  I  was  told 
that  one  man  had  brought  his  father  in  his 
arms  two  hundred  miles  to  be  operated  on 
there. 

In  this  connection  I  may  say  that  in  my 
residence  in  China  I  was  much  interested 
in  the  work  of  the  Christian  missionaries, 
both  Roman  Catholic  and  Protestant. 

Some  of  the  Jesuit  missionaries  who 
wielded  so  great  an  influence  at  the  court 
of  the  Emperors  in  the  seventeenth  cen 
tury,  were  men  of  large  mould  as  scholars, 
divines,  and  statesmen.  It  was  with  great 
reverence  that  I  stood  in  the  cemetery,  just 
outside  the  walls  of  Peking,  where  Ricci, 
Schaal,  Verbiest,  and  others  lie  buried,  and 
thought  how  near,  as  it  seems  to  me,  they 
came  to  making  China  a  Roman  Catholic 
country.  For  a  time  they  won  the  favour 
of  Emperors,  and  led  scholars  and  high 
officials  to  adopt  their  faith.  Their  achieve 
ments,  their  lives  of  self-denial,  their  suffer 
ings  form  a  most  interesting  chapter  in  the 
history  of  missionary  effort. 

[161] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Unhappily  the  success  which  seemed  com 
ing  to  them  was  checked  by  dissensions 
which  sprang  up  between  them  and  the 
Dominicans  concerning  the  lawfulness  of 
ancestral  worship  for  Christian  converts. 
The  controversy  divided  for  a  time  the 
church  in  Europe  and  resulted  in  the  con 
demnation  of  the  Jesuits'  position  by  two 
Popes  and  in  a  decree  by  the  Chinese  Em 
peror  expelling  missionaries  from  the  land. 

All  missionaries  who  have  prohibited 
those  usages  which  we  call  ancestral  wor 
ship  have  found  that  prohibition  one  of  the 
gravest  obstacles  to  the  acceptance  of  the 
Christian  faith.  These  early  Jesuits,  after 
a  careful  study,  concluded  that  the  usages 
were  not  properly  called  worship,  but  were 
only  a  manifestation  of  filial  regard  for  an 
cestors,  which  was  not  at  all  inconsistent 
with  Christian  faith.  Some  of  our  modern 
Protestant  missionaries  hold  the  same 
opinion,  though  most  of  them  do  not.  And 
Popes  Clement  XI  and  Benedict  XIV  were 
led  to  forbid  it  by  Papal  Bulls.  The  con 
flict  on  the  subject  raged  in  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church  for  three  quarters  of  a 
century. 

The  presence  of  many  American  Protes 
tant  missionaries  in  China  raised  questions 
for  my  official  action  from  time  to  time,  as 
[162] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

their  work  was  interfered  with  by  lawless 
men.  But  for  the  most  part  our  mission 
aries  showed  much  tact  and  judgment  in 
avoiding  difficulties.  They  called  on  me 
for  help  so  much  more  rarely  than  some  of 
the  British  missionaries  called  on  Sir 
Thomas  Wade  that  he  once  asked  me 
jocosely  if  I  would  not  trade  missionaries 
with  him. 

Quite  apart  from  any  consideration  of 
their  religious  activity,  the  influence  our 
missionaries  have  exerted  in  preparing  the 
way  for  the  great  change  now  going  on  in 
China  can  hardly  be  overestimated.  A 
considerable  number  of  the  young  men  just 
sent  to  this  country  for  education  have 
received  their  training  in  the  missionary 
schools.  Each  missionary  station  has  fur 
nished  an  illustration  of  the  western  learn 
ing  they  are  coveting. 

We  spent  a  few  days  at  Shanghai,  await 
ing  the  sailing  of  the  French  steamer  Ira- 
wadi,  for  Europe.  Dining  one  evening 
with  Mr.  Cameron,  the  manager  of  the 
Hong  Kong  and  Shanghai  Bank,  he  men 
tioned  two  facts  worth  repeating.  He  said 
his  Bank  had  loaned  many  thousand  pounds 
to  Chinese  merchants  without  taking  so 
much  as  a  scrap  of  paper  to  show  for  it,  and 
the  Bank  never  lost  a  sixpence  by  them. 
[163] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Again,  speaking  of  the  testing  of  the  silver 
sycee,  in  which  they  had  to  deal  largely,  he 
said  they  had  in  their  service  a  Chinaman 
who  by  his  mere  sense  of  touch  could  de 
termine  so  exactly  the  quality  of  the  metal, 
that  his  finding  in  respect  to  it  could  be  as 
absolutely  relied  on  as  analysis.  It  was 
apparently  a  gift  inherited  in  some  families. 

I  met  at  Shanghai  an  American  of  whom 
I  had  often  heard,  the  freight  agent  of  the 
China  Merchants'  Steamship  Company.  I 
was  told  that  he  had  marked  success  in  or 
ganizing  the  business,  that  he  was  very 
musical  and  that  he  was  well  versed  in 
European  languages.  He  was  a  coloured 
man  and  came  to  China  with  Anson  Bur- 
lingame. 

On  our  passage  to  Hong  Kong  the  tail  of 
a  typhoon  struck  us  astern  and  we  were 
obliged  to  put  on  full  steam  to  prevent  the 
following  waves  from  overrunning  us. 
Chinese  junks  going  north  were  lying  with 
large  baskets  attached  to  their  bows,  slowly 
drifting  astern.  I  asked  the  captain  what 
was  to  happen  if,  in  plunging  on  at  such  a 
rate,  we  came  on  one  of  these  junks. 
"Ah!"  said  he,  "nous  le  couperons  comme 
un  fromage."  And  I  fear  he  cared  as  little 
as  though  the  junk  had  been  a  cheese. 

The  voyage  to  Europe,  thirty-eight  days 
[164] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

from  Shanghai  to  Marseilles,  was  very  en 
joyable.  We  called  at  Hong  Kong,  Saigon, 
Singapore,  Point  de  Galle,  Colombo,  Aden, 
Suez,  Port  Said,  and  Naples.  We  had 
intended  to  debark  at  Naples,  but  were 
prevented  by  the  fact  that  at  Singapore  we 
received  some  Dutch  passengers  from  Java, 
where  the  cholera  was  raging.  At  Mar 
seilles  we  were  kept  in  quarantine  twenty- 
four  hours. 

We  made  a  tour  through  Italy,  Germany, 
and  Paris  to  London,  and  sailed  from  Liver 
pool  on  the  Cunard  steamer  "  Catalonia  " 
on  January  28,  for  New  York. 

I  will  mention  here  one  incident  on  the 
journey,  and  our  experience  on  the  voyage. 

Travelling  by  rail  from  Marseilles  to 
Rome,  we  reached  the  little  town  of  Venti- 
miglia  in  the  early  evening  in  the  midst  of 
what  seemed  to  be  a  cloudburst.  The  train 
came  to  a  standstill  just  before  we  arrived 
at  the  station,  and  remained  there  until  the 
water,  coming  down  from  the  cliff,  reached 
the  body  of  the  cars.  The  officials  of  the 
road  asked  us  to  allow  ourselves  to  be 
carried  to  the  station  on  the  backs  of  men. 
As  I  saw  one  fall  down  with  a  passenger,  I 
declined  and  said  we  would  pass  the  night 
in  the  comfortable  carriage  we  were  occupy 
ing.  After  a  little  the  officials  returned 
[165] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

saying  there  was  danger  that  the  track  and 
the  station  would  be  washed  away,  that  the 
train  would  be  pulled  up  to  the  station,  and 
that  we  must  leave  the  carriage.  Accord 
ingly  we  did  so.  We  found  the  water  on  the 
station  floor  ankle  deep.  We  made  our 
way  to  a  little  inn.  On  entering  we  saw  a 
horse  hitched  to  the  post  of  the  front  stair 
way.  The  barn  had  been  undermined  by 
the  storm  and  the  horse  had  been  rescued. 
The  innkeeper  built  a  fire  at  which  we  dried 
our  clothes  and  then  went  to  bed. 

The  next  morning  I  was  told  that  the 
railway  could  not  be  repaired  for  some  days. 
I  decided  to  hire  a  coachman  to  drive  me 
down  the  beautiful  Cornice  road  to  Genoa. 
Hardly  had  we  started  when  the  Mayor 
stopped  us,  saying  that  a  building  in  front 
of  which  we  had  to  pass  was  beginning  to 
fall,  and  that  the  motion  of  our  carriage 
might  tumble  it  down  altogether.  I  finally 
persuaded  him  to  let  us  dismount  and  send 
the  carriage  past  the  building  very  gently, 
while  we  followed  on  foot.  In  this  way  we 
escaped  from  Ventimiglia. 

We  drove  to  San  Remo  to  pass  the  night. 
As  I  was  giving  the  coachman  orders  to  call 
for  us  in  the  morning,  I  was  informed  that 
the  railway  bridge  a  few  miles  further  on 
had  been  carried  away  and  could  not  be 
[166] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

repaired  for  some  days.  After  remaining 
three  days  at  San  Remo,  I  learned  that  a 
temporary  footbridge  had  been  erected 
near  Taggia  by  the  side  of  the  wrecked  rail 
way  bridge,  and  that  from  Taggia  trains 
were  running  eastward.  So  we  drove  to 
the  footbridge,  had  our  trunks  carried  over 
by  porters,  and  finally  reached  a  train. 
So  much  for  railway  travelling  under  the 
shadow  of  the  Italian  Alps. 

As  the  Cunard  line  of  steamers  had  the 
reputation  of  being  very  safe,  I  took  passage 
for  my  family  and  myself  in  the  Cata 
lonia,  which  had  made  but  one  voyage. 
She  was  very  commodious;  but  it  proved 
that  her  engines  were  not  powerful  enough 
to  hold  her  head  up  against  heavy  gales. 
Unluckily  we  encountered  three.  She  was 
obliged  to  run  before  the  wind  in  each  case, 
and  so  went  far  out  of  her  course.  The  sea 
broke  into  the  dining-hall  and  flooded  it. 
As  we  approached  Newfoundland  the  cap 
tain  found  we  were  getting  short  of  fuel  and 
turned  towards  St.  Johns  to  procure  coal. 
But  we  ran  into  so  strong  drift  ice  that  this 
plan  had  to  be  abandoned,  and  we  had  to 
take  our  chance  of  getting  to  Halifax. 
Another  terrific  gale  delayed  us.  We  ran 
by  the  entrance  to  Halifax  harbour  and 
barely  escaped  getting  aground  in  a  small 
[167] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

bay.  It  was  reported  that  we  had  to  burn 
some  of  the  woodwork  of  the  ship  to  make 
the  harbour.  Some  of  us  resolved  to  take 
the  train  to  Boston.  But  a  three  days' 
snow  storm  had  blocked  the  railway.  So 
we  remained  on  the  ship  and  completed  our 
voyage  to  New  York  in  nineteen  days  from 
Liverpool.  The  Company  sent  her  back 
without  taking  passengers. 

We  arrived  at  Ann  Arbor  on  February  24, 
1882,  and  received  a  most  hearty  welcome 
from  Faculties  and  students. 


[168] 


VII 

THE    CANADIAN   FISHERIES    COM 
MISSION  AND  THE  DEEP  WATER 
WAYS  COMMISSION 

IN  October,  1887,  I  was  invited  by  Presi 
dent  Cleveland  to  serve  on  an  International 
Commission  to  adjust  the  difficulties  which 
had  arisen  between  us  and  Canada  in  re 
spect  to  the  fisheries  in  the  waters  near  the 
eastern  coast  of  Canada.  More  or  less 
trouble  had  been  experienced  almost  ever 
since  the  Treaty  of  Independence.  It  had 
often  become  serious  since  the  negotiation 
of  the  Treaty  of  1818,  by  which  our  privi 
leges  were  greatly  curtailed.  Laws,  which 
had  seriously  embarrassed  our  fishermen, 
had  been  enacted  by  Nova  Scotia  and  New 
Brunswick,  and  later  by  the  Dominion 
Parliament,  and  they  had  been  adminis 
tered  with  unfriendly  severity,  and,  as  we 
thought,  in  violation  of  the  Treaty  of  1818. 
The  temporary  relief  furnished  by  the 
Treaty  of  1854,  and  a  part  of  the  Treaty  of 
1871,  was  lost  by  the  abrogation  by  us  of 
the  provisions  which  afforded  the  relief. 
The  friction  between  our  fishermen  and  the 
[169] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Canadian  authorities  had  become  a  menace 
to  the  continuance  of  friendly  relations  be 
tween  us  and  our  neighbour.  Congress  had 
gone  so  far  as  to  authorize  the  President  to 
execute  retaliatory  laws  of  a  severe  nature. 
They  declined  to  authorize  a  commission 
to  negotiate  on  the  subject.  There  was  hot 
blood  on  both  sides. 

In  the  early  autumn  of  1887,  correspond 
ence  with  the  British  government  led  the 
President  to  hope  that  an  international 
commission  might  reach  a  peaceful  and  sat 
isfactory  settlement  of  the  controversy  by 
amending  the  Treaty  of  1818  or  by  making 
a  new  treaty.  The  two  governments  agreed 
to  submit  the  problem  to  such  a  commis 
sion.  The  British  government  appointed 
Joseph  Chamberlain,  Sir  Charles  Tupper, 
the  Premier  of  Canada,  and  Lord  Sackville 
West,  the  British  Minister  at  Washington, 
as  Commissioners.  President  Cleveland 
appointed  Hon.  Thomas  F.  Bayard,  the 
Secretary  of  State,  Hon.  William  L.  Put 
nam,  who  had  been  for  some  time  the  coun 
sel  of  our  government  in  the  fishery  cases, 
and  myself.  I  was  led  to  accept,  partly 
by  the  urgent  request  of  Hon.  E.  J.  Phelps, 
our  Minister  to  Great  Britain,  through 
whose  hands  the  correspondence  of  our 
government  with  Lord  Salisbury  had  passed. 
[170] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

Lord  Playfair  told  me  he  himself  would 
probably  have  been  appointed  on  the  Com 
mission  if  Iddesleigh  had  lived. 

Some  of  my  friends  among  the  Republi 
can  Senators  soon  made  it  clear  to  me  that 
we  should  take  up  our  work  under  the 
heavy  handicap  caused  by  the  fact  that  the 
President  paid  no  regard  to  their  recorded 
opposition  to  the  appointment  of  a  Com 
mission.  As  usual,  however,  he  followed 
his  own  judgment. 

The  Commissioners  held  their  meetings 
at  the  State  Department.  Mr.  John  Bas- 
sett  Moore,  then  Assistant  Secretary  of 
State,  was  our  Secretary,  and  Mr.  Henry 
Bergne,  of  the  British  Foreign  Office,  was 
the  British  Secretary.  We  held  meetings 
two  or  three  times  a  week,  from  November 
21  to  February  15,  except  for  a  few  days 
at  New  Year's,  when  Mr.  Chamberlain  and 
Sir  Charles  went  to  Ottawa  to  confer  with 
the  authorities  there.  I  shall  not  dwell  on 
the  details  of  our  prolonged  discussions. 

From  the  very  outset  we  were  much  em 
barrassed  by  a  misunderstanding  on  the 
part  of  the  British  Commissioners  concern 
ing  the  scope  of  the  conference.  They 
claimed  that  we  were  met  to  consider  the 
fisheries  only  as  a  part  of  our  commercial 
relations,  including  in  fact  the  tariff.  If 
[171] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

this  were  not  understood  to  be  the  case, 
neither  Great  Britain  nor  Canada,  they 
said,  would  be  represented  here.  Although 
Mr.  Bayard  read  his  correspondence  with 
Lord  Salisbury  in  refutation  of  this  assump 
tion,  and  showed  them  that  Congress  alone 
could  change  the  tariff,  more  than  once, 
when  hard  pressed  in  argument  on  the 
details  of  our  work,  they  returned  to  this 
statement,  and  with  much  apparent  feel 
ing.  Our  constant  aim  was  to  hold  them 
to  the  consideration  of  the  indisputable 
fact  that  much  of  the  Canadian  legislation 
concerning  our  fishermen  had  been  of  an 
unfriendly  and  unjustifiable  stringency,  if 
not  in  direct  violation  of  the  Treaty  of  1818, 
and  that  some  change  in  their  policy  was 
absolutely  essential  to  the  continuance  of 
peaceful  relations  between  Canada  and  us. 
We  finally  presented  a  draft  of  a  treaty 
which  provided  for  delimitation  of  the  ex 
clusion  from  the  common  fisheries  and  for 
a  liberal  and  just  interpretation  of  the  con 
ditions,  under  which,  by  the  Treaty  of  1818, 
the  "four  purposes"  for  which  fishing 
vessels  were  to  be  admitted  to  Canadian 
ports  could  be  made  available  to  us.  It 
secured  the  free  navigation  by  our  vessels 
of  the  Strait  of  Canso,  the  purchase  of  sup 
plies  on  the  homeward  voyage,  and  the 
[172] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

liberty  to  unload  and  sell  cargoes  of  fish 
from  ships  in  distress.  It  stipulated  that 
if  duties  on  fish  should  hereafter  be  removed 
by  us,  the  purchase  of  bait  and  fishing 
tackle,  the  transshipment  of  cargo  and  the 
shipping  of  crews,  should  be  allowed  by  the 
Canadians.  After  prolonged  discussions, 
in  which  on  several  occasions  it  appeared 
that  we  were  at  a  deadlock  and  that  no 
agreement  could  be  reached,  an  agreement 
was  reached  on  substantially  the  above 
provisions  on  February  14,  1888,  and  on 
February  15  the  treaty  was  signed. 

As  the  fishing  season  was  soon  to  begin, 
the  British  Commissioners  offered  in  behalf 
of  Canada  a  modus  Vivendi  for  two  years,  by 
which  on  receiving  a  license  an  American 
fishing  vessel  could  have  the  privileges  ac 
corded  by  the  treaty,  even  though  ratifica 
tion  of  it  had  not  been  secured.  This  was 
presented  in  a  separate  communication  to 
our  government  after  the  treaty  was  signed. 
The  Treaty  was  soon  ratified  both  by  the 
Canadian  government  and  by  the  Queen. 
But  in  our  Senate  it  was  opposed  by  every 
Republican  and  so  failed  of  ratification. 

The  modus  has  continually  been  renewed 

by  the  Canadians:  therefore  in  a  sense  we 

have  been  living  under  the  Treaty.     And  no 

better  proof  of  the  worth  of  the  Treaty 

[173] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

could  be  asked  for  than  is  found  in  the  fact 
that  not  for  years  previous  had  there  been 
so  little  friction  on  the  Canadian  coast  as 
there  has  been  since  1888. * 

The  fate  of  the  Treaty  in  the  Senate  con 
firms  the  belief  that  it  is  unwise  to  submit 
an  important  treaty  for  approval  to  that 
body  when  a  Presidential  election  is  at  hand. 
A  party  in  power  is  reluctant  to  have  its 
opponent  get  the  credit  of  settling  a  long  and 
bitter  controversy  on  the  eve  of  an  election. 

During  the  winter  I  met  many  interest 
ing  men,  of  some  of  whom  I  may  say  a  few 
words.  I  prize  especially  the  acquaintance 
and  friendship  I  formed  with  Mr.  Bayard. 
A  man  of  singular  personal  charm,  I  have 
never  known  one  in  public  life  of  higher  and 
nobler  sense  of  public  duty.  He  scorned 
the  mean  arts  of  the  mere  politician  and 
whatever  was  unworthy  in  the  spirit  and 
policy  of  his  own  party.  He  was  so  mag 
nanimous  to  his  opponent,  that  to  a  certain 
degree  his  generosity  unfitted  him  to  ne- 

1  Since  while  the  modus  vivendi,  which  practically  put 
the  treaty  stipulations  largely  in  operation,  continued  in 
force,  we  had  hardly  any  difficulties  in  Canadian  waters, 
perhaps  the  writer  may  be  pardoned  for  raising  the  ques 
tion  whether  if  we  had  ratified  the  Treaty,  subsequent 
negotiations  at  least  on  the  issues  then  under  considera 
tion,  would  not  have  been  unnecessary. 

[174] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

gotiate  with  so  keen  a  man  as  Chamberlain. 
He  was  tempted  to  concede  too  much.  He 
was  gifted  with  wit  which  was  never  un 
generous  or  bitter,  but  always  most  enjoy 
able.  Perhaps  I  may  be  permitted  to  give 
an  illustration.  Lord  Sackville  West,  dur 
ing  our  three  month's  discussions,  never  said 
anything  except  to  move  to  adjourn.  In 
reply  to  my  inquiry,  if  in  his  official  relations 
with  the  Secretary  he  ever  volunteered  any 
remarks,  Mr.  Bayard  said,  "No,  he  simply 
communicates  to  me  in  writing  a  message 
from  Lord  Salisbury,  and  acknowledges  in 
writing  my  reply.  That  is  all."  And  then 
he  added,  "I  can  hardly  understand  why  the 
British  government  keeps  a  minister  on  a 
salary  of  $25,000,  and  then  reduces  him  to 
the  function  of  a  postage  stamp." 

I  saw  not  a  little  of  President  Cleveland. 
I  was  impressed  with  the  readiness  with 
which  he  apprehended  all  the  bearings  of 
the  discussions  which  we  reported  to  him, 
and  the  promptness  and  soundness  of  his 
conclusions.  I  remember  being  in  his  office 
once  at  midnight,  when  he  had  a  great  pile 
of  papers  before  him.  He  said  he  must  go 
through  them  all  before  he  slept.  His 
capacity  for  work  was  prodigious. 

In  company  with  Mr.  Putnam,  I  saw 
much  of  the  Judges  of  the  Supreme  Court, 
[175] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

with  all  of  whom  he  had  an  intimate  ac 
quaintance.  Two  good  stories  I  heard  at 
dinner  at  Judge  Gray's  are  worth  recording. 
One  Judge  Gray  told  of  the  English  Judge 
Jessel.  He  had  a  very  loquacious  barrister 
before  him  one  day.  When  the  latter  was 
pouring  out  aflood  of  words,  the  Judgeasked, 
"Have  you  been  before  any  other  court  with 
this  argument?"  "Yes,"  he  replied,  "but 
the  Judge  stopped  me."  "  He  did,"  said  the 
Judge,  "how  did  he  do  it?" 

William  Allen  Butler,  who  was  at  the 
table,  told  of  a  judge  who  complained  of 
insomnia.  He  said  he  had  been  unable  of 
late  to  sleep  on  the  bench. 

Mr.  Chamberlain  displayed  his  well- 
known  acuteness  in  discussion,  but  in  re 
peatedly  affirming  that  Mr.  Bayard  had 
given  ground  to  suppose  that  we  were  to 
consider  general  commercial  relations,  in 
spite  of  Mr.  Bayard's  assertions  and  proofs 
to  the  contrary,  he  pushed  his  remarks  to 
the  verge  of  discourtesy. 

Sir  Charles  Tupper,  with  bluntness  de 
fending  the  unjustifiable  Canadian  pro 
cedures,  often  found  himself  without  any 
apparent  disturbance  by  his  inconsisten 
cies  in  advocating  measures  one  day  which 
he  opposed  on  the  next  day.  In  his  fervour 
of  debate  he  could  not  conceal  the  fact, 
[176] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

though  he  often  denied  it,  that  his  great 
aim  was  to  compel  us  to  remove  the  duty 
on  fish  so  that  his  countrymen  might  have 
access  to  our  markets. 

The  British  Commissioners,  after  the 
completion  of  the  Treaty,  wished  us  to  take 
up  with  them  the  Alaska  boundary  and  the 
Behring  Sea  questions.  We  were  not  pre 
pared  to  do  so,  and  therefore  declined. 

On  the  initiative  of  Senator  William  F. 
Vilas  of  Wisconsin,  on  March  2,  1895,  an 
Act  was  passed  by  Congress  authorizing  the 
President  to  appoint  three  Commissioners 
to  confer  with  Commissioners  to  be  ap 
pointed  by  Canada  or  Great  Britain  con 
cerning  the  feasibility  of  the  construction 
of  canals  which  would  enable  vessels  en 
gaged  in  ocean  commerce  to  pass  from  the 
Great  Lakes  to  the  Atlantic  Ocean. 

On  November  4,  President  Cleveland  an 
nounced  the  appointment  as  Commission 
ers  of  myself,  as  chairman,  Hon.  John  E. 
Russell,  of  Leicester,  Massachusetts,  a  for 
mer  member  of  Congress  and  Lyman  E. 
Cooley,  C.E.,  of  Chicago,  Illinois,  an  engi 
neer  of  high  repute.  The  Dominion  of 
Canada  appointed  as  its  Commissioners, 
Oliver  A.  Rowland,  M.P.P.,  of  Toronto, 
Thomas  C.  Keefer,  C.E.,  of  Ottawa,  and 
[177] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Thomas  Monro,  C.E.,  of  Coteau  Landing. 
The  last  two  were  engineers  who  had  long 
been  in  the  service  of  the  Dominion  gov 
ernment. 

On  January  15,  1896,  the  American  Com 
missioners  took  the  occasion  of  the  annual 
meeting  of  the  Lake  Carriers'  Association 
to  hold  its  first  meeting  in  Detroit.  We 
took  a  large  amount  of  testimony  from 
shipowners,  masters,  and  merchants,  who 
were  much  interested  in  our  work. 

On  January  18,  we  held  a  joint  meet 
ing  in  Detroit  with  the  Canadian  Com 
missioners  and  marked  out  as  far  as  was 
possible  the  plan  which  we  proposed  to 
pursue.  We  afterwards  held  another  joint 
meeting  at  Niagara  Falls,  Ontario.  The 
Canadian  Commissioners  co-operated  with 
us  most  heartily  there  and  afterwards,  and 
furnished  us  from  the  public  offices  at 
Ottawa  a  large  amount  of  valuable  ma 
terial,  and  made  some  special  surveys  to 
assist  us. 

As  the  problems  to  be  studied  were  largely 
problems  of  engineering,  Mr.  Cooley  was 
authorized  to  establish  an  office  in  Chicago 
and  secure  competent  assistants  to  gather 
from  all  available  sources  the  data  required 
and  prepare  maps  and  plans.  As  only 
$10,000  were  appropriated  for  the  expenses 
[178] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

of  the  Commission,  we  could  not  make 
special  surveys,  but  merely  collate  and  study 
the  information  which  could  be  gathered 
from  various  sources,  and  draw  our  con 
clusions.  This  work  of  course  fell  mainly  on 
Mr.  Cooley,  who  proved  most  competent. 

The  investigation  proved  to  the  Com 
missioners  of  deep  interest  and,  in  their 
opinion,  of  great  importance.  It  convinced 
us  of  the  practicability  of  establishing  deep- 
water  communication  between  the  Great 
Lakes  and  the  Atlantic,  and  of  the  immense 
value  to  our  nation  and  to  the  world  of 
accomplishing  the  task.  Whoever  reads 
the  interesting  report  prepared  for  us  by 
Mr.  Russell  and  examines  the  facts  set 
forth  by  Mr.  Cooley  in  his  Exhibits,  ap 
pended  to  the  Report,  will,  I  think,  be  also 
convinced. 

President  Cleveland  transmitted  the 
Report  to  Congress  with  warm  commenda 
tions  and  recommended  further  appropria 
tions  for  the  continuance  of  the  work. 
The  Report  with  accompanying  documents 
was  published  by  the  Government  in  1897. 
But  as  no  appropriations  were  made,  the 
Commissioners  proceeded  no  further.  Per 
haps  the  task  may  be  taken  up  after  the 
Panama  Canal  is  finished.  If  so,  the  work 
of  our  Commission  may  prove  of  service. 
[179] 


VIII 
SUMMER  TRIPS  TO  EUROPE 

ON  two  occasions  I  have  spent  the  sum 
mer  vacation  in  Europe,  chiefly  in  England. 
In  1886,  my  wife  and  I  went  abroad,  with 
the  purpose  of  dividing  the  summer  be 
tween  London  and  the  cathedral  towns. 
In  1891,  Mr.  Hazard  and  I  went  to  Lon 
don  as  delegates  to  the  first  Pan-Congre 
gational  Council,  and  afterwards  went  to 
the  Baths  at  Wildungen  in  Waldeck,  and 
to  the  Wagner  Festival  at  Bayreuth. 

What  I  am  about  to  write  is  rather  in 
confirmation  of  what  Henry  James  said  to 
me  in  London  in  reply  to  my  inquiry  how 
he  found  so  great  a  charm  in  the  life  of 
that  city.  His  answer  was  that  the  charm 
lies  in  the  fact  that  there  one  sees  so  much 
life.  "  In  Paris,"  he  remarked,  "  one  finds 
clever  men  within  their  limits.  Here  one 
sees  more  of  many  men  and  of  very  marked 
character." 

Though  in  both  visits  I  was  in  London 
only  six  weeks,  and  in  midsummer,  and  in 
no  official  capacity,  I  met  or  heard  dis 
courses  from  a  good  number  of  interesting 
[180] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

men.  This  was  in  part  due  to  the  fact  that 
the  American  Minister,  Edward  J.  Phelps, 
and  his  wife  were  intimate  friends  of  my 
wife  and  myself  and  were  in  London  in  1886. 
At  their  hospitable  table  we  met  Robert 
Browning.  He  was  a  short,  rather  stout 
man  with  a  cheery  face,  and  was  very 
simple  and  cordial  in  manner.  However 
obscure  is  some  of  his  writing,  he  was  lucid 
and  animated  in  conversation.  He  said 
his  living  in  Italy  was  due  to  the  delicate 
health  of  his  wife.  He  spoke  at  some 
length  of  the  stammering  public  speech  of 
Englishmen,  which  he  thought  was  due  to 
an  excessive  consciousness  and  pride.  He 
said  when  he  was  a  boy,  speeches  were  com 
mon  at  ordinary  dinner  parties.  He  him 
self  had  a  great  aversion  to  making  a  speech. 
He  gave  an  interesting  anecdote  of  the 
effect  once  of  inability  to  make  a  speech. 
A  motion  was  pending  in  the  House  of 
Lords  to  alter  the  old  law,  which  for 
bade  a  person  charged  with  murder  to  have 
counsel,  and  so  compelled  him  to  defend 
himself.  A  venerable  peer  attempted  to 
advocate  allowing  such  a  man  to  have  coun 
sel.  He  found  himself  at  a  loss  for  words. 
He  could  not  go  on.  "You  see,  my  Lords," 
he  said,  "my  condition.  Although  I  know 
you  are  all  indulgent  to  me,  you  observe  I 
[1811 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

am  embarrassed  to  express  myself.  Sup 
pose  now  I  were  on  trial  for  murder.  Any 
innocent  man  accused  of  that  crime  might 
be  in  my  plight."  The  situation  was  so 
impressive  that  his  view  prevailed. 

In  answer  to  our  urgent  request  that  he 
come  to  our  country  and  meet  his  many 
admirers,  he  gave  no  encouragement,  though 
he  expressed  a  most  grateful  appreciation 
of  the  favour  shown  to  his  works  in  the 
United  States. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  men  I  met  at 
the  Pan-Congregational  Council  was  Rev. 
John  Brown,  D.D.,  Pastor  of  the  Church  of 
Bedford,  in  which  Bunyan  preached,  and 
author  of  an  excellent  biography  of  Bunyan. 
With  him  we  visited  Bunyan's  cottage  at 
Elstow.  He  informed  me  that  Bunyan's 
family  had  lived  in  that  village  for  cen 
turies.  He  said  he  knew  descendants  of 
Bunyan  more  than  fifty  years  old,  who  had 
never  read  "Pilgrim's  Progress." 

Dr.  Brown  told  some  stories  of  the  wit 
of  Dr.  Magee,  the  Archbishop  of  York. 
Among  them  were  these  two.  A  man,  with 
whom  he  was  discussing,  said,  "I  am  not  so 
stupid  as  I  may  look."  To  which  the  Arch 
bishop  replied,  "For  that  give  God  thanks." 
When  he  went  to  York  to  be  consecrated  as 
Archbishop,  some  woman  passing  by  him, 
[182] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

exclaimed,  "What  an  ugly  mouth!"  He. 
overhearing  it,  said  to  her,  "You  are  right, 
madam,  but  it  has  made  my  fortune." 

Dr.  Brown  and  other  preachers  spoke 
freely  of  the  social  disadvantages  under 
which  young  men  and  young  women  in 
dissenters'  families  found  themselves.  He 
informed  me  that  one  Anglican  clergyman 
in  his  neighbourhood  had  recently  in  a 
sermon  or  public  address  declared  that 
persons  married  by  any  but  an  Anglican 
clergyman  were  living  in  adultery.  When 
Dr.  Brown  called  the  attention  of  the 
clergyman's  bishop  to  this  the  clergyman 
was  reprimanded. 

At  a  tea  given  by  the  Bible  Society  at 
their  house,  I  saw  what  was  said  to  be  the 
largest  collection  of  Bibles  in  the  world, 
and  was  told  the  following  story  of  the 
origin  of  that  renowned  society: 

A  Welsh  girl,  named  Mary  Jones,  walked 
many  miles  to  beg  a  Bible  of  a  minister. 
He  had  none  to  spare  for  her.  She  went 
home  weeping,  but  on  his  promise  to  get 
one  for  her,  she  walked  again  twenty-five 
miles  to  procure  it.  The  minister  came  to 
London,  told  the  story,  and  persuaded  men 
to  found  the  society. 

I  went  one  morning  at  8  o'clock  to  break 
fast  with  the  directors  of  the  Tract  So- 
[183] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

ciety  at  their  rooms  in  Paternoster  Row. 
These  directors,  busy  men,  fifteen  in  num 
ber,  meet  every  Tuesday  morning  at  that 
early  hour  for  breakfast  and  the  transac 
tion  of  the  business  of  the  society.  They 
were  criticizing  tracts  which  they  had  all 
carefully  read.  Here,  as  at  the  meeting  of 
the  directors  of  the  Bible  Society,  I  was 
deeply  impressed  by  the  fidelity  of  these 
officers  of  the  societies  in  the  discharge  of 
their  duties. 

Calling  at  the  Foreign  Office  on  Mr. 
Henry  (afterwards  Sir  Henry)  Bergne  who 
was  the  English  Secretary  to  the  Fisheries 
Commission  on  which  I  served  in  1887-8, 
I  was  introduced  to  Sir  Edward  Herstlet, 
and  was  shown  by  him  into  the  rooms  where 
the  Treaties  are  preserved.  I  seemed  to 
have  a  large  part  of  the  history  of  modern 
Europe  in  my  hands  as  I  held  an  Official 
copy  of  the  great  Treaty  of  Vienna  of  1815 
and  one  of  the  Treaty  of  Paris  of  1856. 

As  an  illustration  of  the  remark  of  Henry 
James  about  the  life  in  London,  I  may  say 
that  attending  one  afternoon  a  garden 
party  given  by  Lord  and  Lady  Jersey,  I 
met  and  was  presented  to,  among  others, 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Lecky,  Lord  Sherbrooke,  Sir 
Richard  Webster,  then  Attorney  General, 
now  Lord  Chief  Justice,  Prof.  Ray  Lankester, 
[1841 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

and  Mr.  Knowles,  editor  of  the  Nineteenth 
Century  Magazine.  On  the  return  in  the 
train,  an  English  gentleman,  speaking  of 
the  peerage  just  granted  to  Bass,  the 
brewer,  repeated  Labouchere's  quotation 
concerning  the  elevation  of  Allsop,  "  Surgit 
quidquid  amarum." 

Mr.  Ouless,  the  painter,  told  a  good  story 
in  my  hearing.  Poole,  the  fashionable 
tailor,  having  lent  money  to  some  of  the 
nobility,  was  sometimes  invited  by  them 
into  company.  Once,  when  he  had  been  to 
Lord  -  -'s,  he  was  asked  what  he  thought 
of  the  gathering.  He  replied  that  it  was 
well  enough,  but  the  company  was  a  little 
mixed.  "How,"  some  one  said.  "What 
could  you  ask?  You  could  not  expect  they 
would  all  be  tailors." 

Perhaps  the  most  striking  illustration  of 
freedom  of  speech  in  England  is  witnessed 
in  Hyde  Park  on  Sunday  afternoon,  when 
the  advocates  of  every  opinion  are  allowed 
such  unrestrained  liberty  of  utterance  in 
the  hearing  of  any  persons  they  can  induce 
to  listen.  At  various  stands  on  one  occa 
sion  I  heard  the  following  speakers.  No.  1 : 
A  Spiritualist;  No.  2:  An  atheist;  No.  3: 
Anti-government,  anti-rent,  anti-everything 
existing,  a  French  revolutionist  in  manner 
and  in  appearance;  No.  4:  A  lay  preacher 
[  185  ] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

of  the  gospel.  No.  5 :  A  reformed  drunk 
ard;  No.  6:  An  anti-vivisectionist;  No.  7: 
A  rabid  and  radical  socialist.  The  spirit 
ualist  and  the  lay  preacher  had  the  largest 
audiences.  But  the  authorities  interfered 
with  none  of  them.  There  was  no  disorder. 

In  1891,  Mr.  Hazard  and  I  made  a  visit 
to  the  Continent  after  the  close  of  the 
Council  in  London.  We  spent  some  days 
in  Brussels,  where  Mr.  Hazard  had  import 
ant  business  relations.  I  asked  prominent 
men  there  why  Belgium,  a  neutralized  coun 
try,  charged  itself  with  the  expense  of  an 
army  of  a  hundred  thousand  men.  Their 
answer  was  that  the  Great  Powers  virtually 
require  it  to  prevent  any  state  from  taking 
advantage  of  a  defenceless  condition,  and 
furthermore,  the  officers  drawn  from  the 
higher  classes  have  influence  enough  in  the 
government  to  maintain  an  effective  force. 

We  spent  some  time  at  Wildungen  in 
Waldeck,  where  are  excellent  springs  with 
medicinal  qualities  like  the  waters  at  Carls 
bad.  The  waters,  however,  are  cold  and 
most  palatable.  Some  five  thousand  vis 
itors,  mostly  German,  were  there,  among 
them  being  our  friend  Carl  Schurz.  These 
springs  apparently  are  not  widely  known  in 
this  country,  though  they  deserve  to  be. 
From  this  little  state  came  Bunsen,  the  his- 
[1861 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

torian,  Kaulbach,  the  painter,  and  Rauch 
and  Drake,  the  sculptors.  I  took  long  walks 
into  the  surrounding  country,  which  is  in 
habited  by  well-to-do  peasants.  They  have 
comfortable  houses,  but  the  manure  heap, 
apparently  the  accumulation  of  months,  is 
often  in  the  front  yard.  Sometimes  the 
residence  is  in  the  second  story,  the  barn 
occupying  the  first  story. 

We  went  to  Bayreuth  to  attend  the  Wag 
ner  Festival.  Knowing  that  Jean  Paul 
lived  in  that  town  for  years  and  died  there, 
I  sought  to  find  his  house.  The  cabman  had 
no  knowledge  where  it  was.  Entering  the 
principal  bookshop,  I  asked  a  young  woman 
who  was  in  charge,  where  the  house  was. 
She  was  unable  to  tell  me.  Soon  strolling 
down  the  street,  not  fifty  rods  from  the 
bookshop,  I  came  on  the  house,  a  fine  three- 
story  dwelling  with  an  inscription  on  it, 
giving  me  the  information  I  desired.  Verily, 
I  thought,  the  prophet  was  without  honour 
in  his  own  country.  We  found  his  statue 
and  the  grave  of  Liszt  without  inquiry. 


[187] 


IX 

THE    MISSION   TO   THE   OTTOMAN 
EMPIRE 

IN  the  spring  of  1897, 1  was  asked  by  Rev. 
Dr.  Storrs,  President  of  the  American 
Board  of  Commissioners  of  Foreign  Mis 
sions,  if  I  would  accept  the  position  of 
Minister  to  Japan  or  Turkey,  if  desired  by 
the  President.  Mr.  William  E.  Dodge,  of 
New  York,  speaking  for  the  Presbyterians, 
asked  the  same  question  with  respect  to 
Turkey.  They  both  had  in  mind  the  in 
terests  of  Christian  missions.  I  gave  both 
to  understand  that  if  the  offer  of  such  a 
position  came  unsought  by  me,  I  would  give 
it  consideration. 

In  April,  Senator  McMillan,  at  the  re 
quest  of  President  McKinley,  inquired  by 
telegraph  whether  I  would  accept  the  po 
sition  in  Turkey.  After  some  correspond 
ence,  I  finally  wrote  that  I  would  accept, 
provided  I  could  return  at  the  end  of  a 
year  or  remain  longer  if  I  chose.  While, 
with  my  wife  and  daughter,  I  was  on  a 
visit  to  New  Orleans,  my  name  was  sent 
to  the  Senate  and  promptly  confirmed.  On 
[188] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

my  return  home  the  Regents  gave  me  leave 
of  absence  for  a  year  from  October.  The 
Legislature  of  Michigan  passed  a  vote  of 
thanks  to  the  President  for  the  appoint 
ment. 

On  May  6,  I  visited  Washington  and  had 
interviews  with  the  President,  Secretary  of 
State  John  Sherman,  and  other  officers  of 
the  State  Department,  all  of  whom  received 
me  very  cordially.  But  two  despatches 
were  received  from  Mr.  Terrell,  our  minis 
ter  at  Constantinople,  which  led  me  to  ask 
the  President  to  excuse  me  from  serving. 
The  first  said  the  report  had  come  to  him 
that  while  in  the  South  I  had  charged 
Russia  with  fomenting  disturbances  in  Tur 
key,  and  that  on  this  account  my  relations 
with  the  Russian  Ambassador  would  be 
strained.  The  second  stated  that  the  Sul 
tan  objected  to  me  because  I,  like  most  of 
the  American  missionaries,  belonged  to  the 
denomination  of  Congregationalists.  I  did 
not  desire  to  go  with  these  difficulties  as  a 
handicap.  But  Secretary  Sherman  tele 
graphed  my  denial  of  the  truth  of  the  first 
despatch.  It  being  soon  ascertained  that 
the  Sultan  had  made  the  mistake  of  con 
founding  the  denomination  of  Congrega 
tionalists  with  such  an  organization  as  the 
Congregation  of  the  Jesuits,  with  which  he 
[189] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

had  controversies,  our  Secretary  in  charge 
of  the  Legation  telegraphed  that  the  objec 
tion  to  me  was  withdrawn. 

I  may  as  well  say  here  that  no  one  of  the 
European  Ambassadors  was  more  cordial 
to  me  on  my  arrival  than  Mr.  Nelidoff,  the 
veteran  Russian  Ambassador  and  that  the 
other  ambassadors  in  answer  to  my  in 
quiries,  assured  me  that  they  never  heard 
the  least  criticism  of  me  from  Mr.  Nelidoff, 
or  from  any  Embassy  or  Legation. 

Furthermore,  I  may  say,  that  the  Sultan 
was  always  most  affable  to  me  in  my  inter 
views  with  him,  even  when  I  had  to  discuss 
some  missionary  questions.  In  fact,  I 
never  saw  any  traces  of  the  difficulties 
which  Mr.  Terrell  reported. 

The  President  and  the  Secretary  declined 
to  listen  to  my  requests  to  be  excused  from 
service.  I  decided  to  go  to  my  post,  and 
made  my  arrangements  to  sail  on  July  17, 
for  Havre.  My  wife  and  I  left  home  on 
July  14.  We  reached  Paris  at  an  early 
hour  on  July  26.  While  we  were  there, 
floods  in  Austria  destroyed  the  railways,  by 
which  we  had  planned  to  go  to  Constanti 
nople.  So  we  were  compelled  to  go  to 
Marseilles  and  take  the  steamer. 

On  the  way  south  we  visited  Avignon, 
Nfmes  and  Aries.  After  a  comfortable  voy- 
[190] 


JAMES  B.  ANGELL 

age  on  the  Messageries  steamship  "  Senegal," 
we  reached  Constantinople  late  in  the  after 
noon  of  the  18th.  Mr.  Riddle,  the  Secre 
tary,  Mr.  Short,  the  Consul,  and  a  Turkish 
official,  representing  the  Grand  Vizier,  were 
at  the  wharf  to  greet  us.  In  the  Legation 
launch  we  proceeded  at  once  to  Therapia 
and  took  lodgings  for  the  summer  at  the 
Palace  Summer  Hotel.  The  next  morning  a 
messenger  from  the  Sultan  called  to  greet  me. 

As  soon  as  convenient  I  made  my  calls 
on  the  Ambassadors  and  Ministers.  Baron 
Calice,  the  Austrian,  was  the  Dean,  a  most 
courteous  and  amiable  man  with  an  Eng 
lish  wife.  His  long  service  at  that  post 
made  his  knowledge  of  affairs  valuable  to 
us  all.  Nelidoff,  the  Russian,  soon  trans 
ferred  to  Rome,  had  been  considered  the 
most  influential  representative.  He  was 
succeeded  by  Zinovieff ,  a  shrewd  man,  whose 
whole  career  had  been  made  in  Asiatic 
service.  He  informed  me  that  Russia 
trained  its  men  in  diplomatic  service, 
especially  for  Asiatic  or  for  European  posts. 
He  had  been  much  in  Persia  and  under 
stood  the  operations  of  the  Oriental  mind. 
Russia  treats  Turkey  as  belonging  to  the 
Asiatic  department. 

Sir  Philip  Currie,  the  British  Ambassa 
dor,  had  been  taken,  as  Pauncefote  was, 
[191] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

directly  from  the  Foreign  Office  for  dip 
lomatic  service.  He  was  a  man  of  the 
finest  presence;  but  he  could  not  get  on 
with  the  Sultan.  His  English  love  of  jus 
tice  and  honesty  made  him  impatient  with 
the  artful  devices  and  the  wickedness  of  the 
Turkish  officials.  He  was  obliged  to  see 
Great  Britain  losing  its  influence  and  could 
not  conceal  his  indignation  at  the  policies 
of  the  Turkish  government.  But  it  was 
refreshing  to  hear  his  noble  English  spirit 
express  itself. 

Lady  Currie,  known  in  her  own  country 
as  an  author  of  fiction,  was  a  woman  of 
great  brightness  of  mind  and  of  singular 
charm  of  manner. 

Monsieur  Cambon,  the  French  Ambassa 
dor,  was  a  most  attractive  personality. 
He  had  been  at  his  post  in  the  time  of  the 
massacres  and  exerted  himself  to  the  ut 
most  to  induce  his  government  to  interpose 
by  force  to  put  an  end  to  the  cruel  violence. 
He  thought  the  Great  Powers  missed  a  rare 
opportunity  at  that  crisis.  He  had  the 
finest  powers  of  a  French  conversationalist. 
I  always  counted  it  a  happy  hour  when  I 
could  meet  him.  He  is  most  worthily 
representing  his  country  in  London.  He 
is  an  elder  brother  of  the  ambassador  who 
won  such  favour  with  us  at  Washington 
[192] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

during  the  Spanish  War,  in  the  delicate 
position  of  being  the  medium  of  communi 
cation  between  us  and  Spain,  and  who  now 
holds  the  difficult  position  of  French  Am 
bassador  at  Berlin. 

The  German  Ambassador  on  my  arrival 
was  Baron  Saurmar-Jeltsch,  who  had  been 
Minister  at  Washington,  a  large,  bluff, 
blue-eyed  hunter,  who  liked  killing  wild 
boars  better  than  formal  dinners.  But  he 
was  soon  succeeded  by  that  able  and  dis 
tinguished  statesman,  Marschall  von  Biber- 
stein,  a  man  of  high  intelligence  and  great 
force  of  character.  The  German  Emperor, 
who  has  sought  and  not  without  success  to 
secure  the  influence  in  Turkey  once  wielded 
by  Great  Britain,  sent  this  strong  and  vigi 
lant  man  to  carry  out  his  policy.  He  soon 
made  his  power  felt,  and  until  the  depo 
sition  of  the  Sultan,  Abdul  Hamid,  was 
undoubtedly  the  leading  ambassador  at 
Constantinople . 

Signor  Pansa,  the  Italian  Ambassador, 
was  a  very  agreeable  gentleman,  but  Italy 
apparently  did  not  find  her  voice  considered 
of  as  much  weight  as  that  of  the  other 
Great  Powers. 

My  relation  with  the  Spanish  Minister, 
Urrutia,  was  very  friendly.  He  was  trans 
ferred  after  a  few  months  and  succeeded  by 
[193] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

a  Marquis,  who  had  been  at  St.  Petersburg. 
In  that  capital,  as  is  well  known,  social 
functions  begin  at  a  very  late  hour,  some 
times  at  midnight.  He  was  asked  after  he 
had  been  in  Constantinople  some  weeks, 
how  he  found  life  there.  "Oh,"  said  he, 
"in  many  respects  very  well.  But  I  must 
say  it  is  the  dullest  place  I  have  been  in, 
after  2  o'clock  in  the  morning."  He  was 
a  most  affable  gentleman,  and  although  the 
outbreak  of  the  Spanish  War  compelled 
him  and  me  to  break  off  formal  social 
relations,  we  never  sacrificed  our  friendly 
feelings. 

At  the  time  of  my  arrival  the  ambassa 
dors  of  the  six  Great  Powers  were  in  ses 
sion  with  an  Ottoman  representative  for 
the  purpose  of  adjusting  the  relations  of 
Turkey  with  Greece  and  the  Balkan  States. 
The  Congress  did  not  accomplish  very  im 
portant  results.  The  diplomatic  wits  said 
it  served  to  show  "  Vimpuissance  des  Grandes 
Puissances."  But  in  part  at  least  owing 
to  their  influence  a  satisfactory  Treaty  of 
Peace  between  Turkey  and  Greece  was 
negotiated. 

It  is  well  known  that  German  officers, 
loaned  to  the  Sultan  by  the  German  Em 
peror,  really  planned  the  campaign  against 
Greece  nominally  conducted  by  Edhem 
[194] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

Pasha.  One  of  the  German  officers  who 
was  wounded  in  the  war  told  me  that  the 
Turkish  victories  might  easily  have  been 
made  more  decisive  if  the  German  advisers 
could  have  persuaded  the  Turkish  com 
mander  to  get  up  and  have  any  fighting 
before  noon. 

On  September  3,  I  was  received  by  the 
Sultan.  The  whole  staff  of  the  Legation 
and  the  Consulate,  were  present.  Court 
carriages  came  for  us.  The  Assistant  In 
troducer,  Ghabit  Bey,  who  had  called  on 
me  in  the  name  of  the  Sultan,  on  my  arrival, 
occupied  the  carriage  with  me  and  my 
dragoman.  The  soldiers  at  all  the  guard 
houses  saluted  as  we  passed.  Arriving  at 
the  Imperial  Palace,  the  Yildiz  Kiosk, 
Munir  Pasha,  the  Chamberlain,  met  us. 
Officers  in  brilliant  uniform  were  gathered 
in  the  large  reception  room.  The  Secre 
tary  of  Foreign  Affairs,  Tewfik  Pasha,  then 
escorted  me  to  a  smaller  room,  where  the 
Sultan  was  standing  by  the  side  of  a  small 
table.  He  wore  his  semi-military  blue 
frock  coat  with  no  binding  and  wore  many 
jewels  and  decorations.  I  read  my  speech 
in  English,  of  which  one  copy  in  English 
and  one  in  French  had  already  been  sent. 
The  Turkish  Secretary  then  read  a  Turk 
ish  version.  The  Sultan  replied  in  a  low 
[195] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

but  pleasant  voice,  substantially  recipro 
cating  the  wishes  and  sentiments  I  had 
expressed.  The  Secretary  also  in  a  gentle 
tone  rendered  the  Sultan's  speech  in  French. 
The  bearing  of  the  Sultan  was  affable  and 
cordial. 

I  then  withdrew  to  the  salon,  where  ciga 
rettes  and  light  refreshments  were  served. 
The  great  hero  of  the  Russo-Turkish  War, 
Osman  Pasha,  and  other  notable  persons 
were  present.  After  a  little  we  returned  to 
the  Legation  and  served  refreshments  to 
the  guests. 

On  the  next  day  I  made  my  calls  on  the 
Ministers  of  the  Porte.  I  will  say  a  few 
words  of  those  with  whom  I  had  subse 
quently  to  do  business. 

The  Grand  Vizier,  Khalil  Rifaat  Pasha, 
was  an  old  man  whose  mind  seemed  to 
act  very  slowly,  but  who  in  all  my  dealings 
with  him  was  just  and  fair  and  obliging. 

The  Secretary  of  Foreign  Affairs,  Tewfik 
Pasha,  was  a  most  affable  and  attractive 
man.  I  sometimes  thought  he  was  too 
ready  to  agree  with  me  and  to  say  yes  to 
my  requests,  especially  when  it  proved  he 
had  not  the  power  to  make  good  his  prom 
ises.  He  had  been  Ambassador  at  Berlin, 
and  there  married  a  German  lady.  I  often 
wondered  whether  in  accepting  his  hand 
[196] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

she  supposed  she  was  to  be  admitted  to 
diplomatic  society  in  Constantinople.  As 
a  matter  of  fact  she  was  obliged,  like  all 
Turkish  wives,  to  live  in  seclusion. 

Zahdi  Pasha,  the  Minister  of  Public  In 
struction,  was  an  amiable  elderly  man  with 
whom  I  had  much  pleasant  conversation 
on  education.  He  regretted  the  failure  of 
many  officials  to  appreciate  the  value  of 
general  education.  He  complained  that 
this  greatly  hindered  his  work,  in  which  he 
seemed  deeply  interested.  I  may  relate 
an  incident  which  illustrates  the  devout- 
ness  of  the  pious  Turks,  which  they  are  not 
ashamed  to  have  us  know.  On  calling  at 
his  office  one  day  at  3  o'clock,  I  saw  him 
kneeling  and  praying.  I  proposed  to  the 
porter  that  I  should  withdraw  until  he  was 
free  to  see  me.  "Oh  no,"  said  he,  "come 
in  and  take  a  seat."  I  did  so.  The  Min 
ister  on  his  prayer  rug  continued  some  ten 
minutes  at  his  devotions,  then  arose,  and 
without  any  ceremony  greeted  me  and  gave 
attention  to  my  business.  One  could  hardly 
have  such  an  experience  with  a  cabinet 
officer  in  a  Christian  land. 

He  rendered  me  a  valuable  service  in 
instituting  a  search  for  an  ancient  manu 
script,  alleged  by  the  author  of  a  book, 
written  in  Missouri,  to  be  in  the  library  of 
[197] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Santa  Sophia.  This  book  is  entitled  the 
"Archko  Volume."  It  professes  to  give 
the  contents  of  manuscripts  called  the 
Acta  Pilati,  found  in  the  Vatican,  and  con 
firmed  in  the  library  of  Santa  Sophia,  giving 
many  details  concerning  the  early  life  and 
the  trial  and  execution  of  Jesus.  It  was 
published  in  Philadelphia  by  the  Anti 
quarian  Book  Company  in  1896.  It  bears 
on  the  face  of  it  the  appearance  of  a  fraud. 
A  gentleman  sent  me  the  book  with  the 
request  that  I  ascertain  whether  there  is 
in  the  library  of  Santa  Sophia  such  a  manu 
script  or  book  as  is  referred  to  by  the  author 
as  the  authority  for  the  narrations  he  gives. 
The  Minister  informed  me  that  the  library 
in  question  was  under  his  special  care  and  he 
would  order  a  most  thorough  search.  A  few 
weeks  later  he  informed  me  that  the  search 
had  been  made  and  that  there  was  no  trace 
of  any  such  work  in  the  library.  His  report 
did  not  surprise  me. 

Said  Pasha,  President  of  the  Council,  had 
been  formerly  Secretary  of  Foreign  Affairs 
and  Ambassador  to  Berlin,  and  had  been  in 
public  service  all  his  life.  He  was  a  fine 
story  teller  and  had  a  good  sense  of  humour. 
He  spoke  with  much  interest  of  John  A. 
Kasson,  who  represented  us  at  Berlin. 
Among  his  stories  was  one  of  his  handling 
[198] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

of  a  missionary  case  when  he  was  Governor 
at  Salonica.  An  American  woman  teach 
ing  a  missionary  school  had  been  annoyed 
by  a  young  Turkish  hoodlum  throwing 
stones  at  her  school  house  and  made  com 
plaint  to  the  Governor.  He  summoned  the 
lad  and  was  satisfied  of  his  guilt.  He  then 
sent  for  the  young  woman,  told  her  that 
he  desired  to  frighten  the  fellow  by  threat 
ening  him  in  her  presence  with  very  severe 
punishment,  and  suggested  that  if  she  would 
then  interpose  and  ask  for  his  release  the 
effect  on  the  public  would  be  most  salutary, 
and  insure  her  and  her  colleagues  against 
further  annoyance.  She  had  the  good 
sense  to  agree  to  this  treatment  of  the  case. 
His  programme  was  carried  out  and  there 
was  no  further  interference  with  missionary 
work  while  he  was  in  Salonica. 

Of  all  the  ministers,  he  and  Tewfik  Pasha 
alone  spoke  French.  Munir  Pasha,  the 
Sultan's  interpreter,  spoke  French.  It  was 
generally  believed  that  the  Sultan,  who 
when  a  lad  was  some  time  in  Paris,  could 
understand  it  fairly.  But  he  insisted  in 
using  Turkish  altogether  in  his  interviews 
with  the  diplomats. 

The  Porte  under  Abdul  Hamid  had  lost 
the  power  which  it  had  under  his  predeces 
sors.  He  insisted  on  reviewing  the  whole 
[199] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

of  their  work  before  action  was  taken  on 
any  affair  of  the  least  consequence.  There 
fore  after  working  for  weeks  to  carry  a 
measure  through  the  Cabinet,  the  foreign 
representative  found  his  work  only  just 
begun.  And  even  with  the  best  purpose  on 
the  part  of  the  Sultan  to  expedite  business, 
it  was  simply  impossible  for  him  to  accom 
plish  it.  And  if  he  did  wish  to  delay  it,  he 
had  a  ready  excuse.  The  diplomatic  body 
with  one  accord  were  greatly  dissatisfied 
with  the  course  which  had  to  be  taken, 
even  with  urgent  business.  Moreover  there 
had  grown  up  a  sharp  rivalry,  one  might 
almost  say  hostility,  between  the  Porte  and 
the  Secretaries  and  other  officials  at  the 
Palace.  It  was  currently  reported  and 
widely  believed  that  the  Secretaries  at  the 
Palace  had  to  be  bribed  if  important 
measures  were  to  be  attended  to  with  any 
promptness. 

One  day,  after  the  completion  of  a  little 
transaction  which  had  dragged  along  for 
weeks,  I  said  with  some  impatience  to 
Tewfik  Pasha,  "  Why  do  you  have  such  ways 
of  doing  business?  I  have  heard  that  you 
are  cousins  to  the  Chinese.  And  you  do 
have  this  same  habit  of  provoking  delay  in 
finishing  a  task  which  in  America  we  should 
do  in  fifteen  minutes.  Why  is  it?"  With 
[200] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

his  amiable  smile,  which  partially  disarmed 
me,  he  replied,  "Well,  I  can  only  say  that 
is  our  way."  And  that  was  the  only  ex 
planation. 

Of  course  I  had  several  interviews  with 
the  Sultan  on  business.  Although  subse 
quently  our  Legation  was  raised  to  an 
Embassy  on  the  alleged  ground  that  the 
Minister  had  not  the  same  facility  of  access 
to  the  Sultan  which  the  Ambassadors  en 
joyed,  I  had  no  occasion  to  make  that  com 
plaint.  I  found  no  difficulty  in  securing  an 
audience  when  it  was  necessary.  The  bear 
ing  of  the  Sultan  was  always  affable.  He 
heard  with  attention  what  I  had  to  say  and 
replied  politely.  On  one  occasion,  during 
an  audience,  a  messenger  entered  in  great 
excitement  with  what  appeared  to  be  an 
important  message.  I  offered  to  withdraw. 
The  Sultan  detained  me.  He  gave  some 
orders  to  the  messenger.  He  then  informed 
me  that  the  message  was  that  his  sister's 
palace  on  the  Bosphorus  was  on  fire  and 
that  he  had  given  orders  to  have  the  fire 
men  hasten  to  the  palace  and  to  have  his 
sister  and  her  children  brought  to  his  pal 
ace.  Then  he  proceeded  to  preach  a  brief 
but  excellent  sermon  to  the  effect  that  when 
misfortune  comes  we  must  do  our  best  to 
avert  it,  but  having  done  that  in  resigna- 
[201] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

tion  and  faith,  must  leave  all  to  God.  I 
ventured  to  reply  that  his  doctrine  would 
be  deemed  good  in  all  lands. 

He  remarked  playfully  to  me  one  day 
that  I  was  the  only  American  Minister  who 
ever  came  to  his  court  who  spoke  French. 
In  this  I  think  he  must  have  been  in  error. 

When  he  learned  that  I  was  going  to 
Jerusalem  and  Damascus,  without  any  re 
quest  on  ^  my  part  he  sent  orders  to  his 
officials  in  the  Holy  Land  to  greet  me  and 
aid  me  in  my  journey.  They  did  this  to 
an  extent  which  was  sometimes  almost  em 
barrassing.  I  mention  his  courtesies,  be 
cause  I  cannot  but  criticize  and  condemn 
many  features  of  his  government. 

Though  he  was  averse  to  allowing  capital 
punishment,  it  was  believed  that  his  morbid 
fear  of  assassination  and  his  dread  of  revo 
lution  led  him  to  severe  punishment  of 
mere  boys  and  to  the  exile  to  remote  prov 
inces  of  some  of  the  best  men  in  the  empire. 
Two  cases  of  the  unjust  punishment  of  boys 
came  to  my  personal  knowledge.  A  lad 
who  had  been  a  student  in  Robert  College 
found  his  funds  exhausted  so  that  he  could 
not  complete  his  education  there.  Having 
heard  that  the  Sultan  sometimes  gave 
scholarships  in  a  Turkish  school,  one  Friday 
he  pushed  through  the  military  lines  which 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

guard  the  Sultan  on  his  way  to  the  mosque, 
and  threw  into  the  carriage  a  petition  for  the 
scholarship.  It  is  a  tradition  of  great  an 
tiquity  in  Oriental  lands  that  any  subject 
may  petition  the  sovereign.  When  the  lad 
came  home,  one  of  his  comrades  asked  him 
how  he  succeeded  in  approaching  the  Sul 
tan's  carriage.  The  lad  replied  with  fatal  in 
discretion,  "  Why,  it  was  easy  enough.  I  was 
so  near  him  I  could  have  shot  him."  This 
unhappy  remark  being  repeated,  he  was 
arrested,  charged  with  threatening  the  life 
of  the  Sultan,  convicted  and  sentenced  to 
fifteen  years'  imprisonment.  All  efforts  of 
influential  friends  to  secure  a  modification 
of  the  sentence  were  in  vain. 

The  other  case  occurred  in  the  Turkish 
Medical  School  in  Constantinople.  Some 
men  of  revolutionary  spirit  gained  access  to 
the  school  and  scattered  incendiary  cir 
culars  about  the  building.  One  of  these 
papers  was  found  in  the  room  of  a  young 
student  from  Smyrna,  though  he  affirmed 
through  no  agency  of  his.  He  was  ban 
ished,  but  his  poor  mother  could  not  learn 
where.  In  her  despair  she  made,  through 
a  lawyer  whom  I  knew,  a  request  of  me  that 
I  would  forward  through  the  Sultan's  Sec 
retary  a  petition  to  His  Majesty,  that  she 
might  be  informed  where  he  had  been  sent, 
[203] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

and  that  she  might  be  allowed  to  go  to  the 
same  place  and  see  him  occasionally.  Find 
ing  that  under  the  usages  at  the  Palace  I 
could  without  impropriety  oblige  her,  I  did 
forward  the  petition,  which  was  one  of  the 
most  pathetic  papers  I  ever  read.  But  I 
never  heard  of  any  results. 

Many  absurd  laws  and  regulations  in 
force  in  the  capital  at  the  time  of  my  resi 
dence  were  believed  to  be  due  to  the  Sul 
tan's  fear.  For  instance,  though  the  city 
had  nearly  a  million  inhabitants  there  was 
no  local  mail.  One  had  to  send  letters  by 
special  messengers  to  persons  in  the  city. 
It  was  said  that  though  there  had  formerly 
been  mail  facilities,  the  Sultan  suppressed 
them  because  he  received  so  many  threaten 
ing  postal  cards  and  because  conspirators 
could  by  mail  easily  mature  dangerous 
schemes. 

I  had  two  singular  controversies  with  the 
customs  officers  to  handle.  An  Englishman, 
after  visiting  the  hospital  connected  with 
one  of  our  American  mission  stations,  gen 
erously  sent  out  from  London  a  thousand 
dollars'  worth  of  medicines  as  a  present  for 
the  physician  to  use  in  his  merciful  work. 
In  the  invoice  was  a  small  quantity  of  car 
bolic  acid,  a  remedy  used  in  the  treatment 
of  sore  throats.  It  happens  that  it  can 
[204] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

also  be  used  in  the  preparation  of  the  explo 
sive  gun  cotton.  On  that  account  the  whole 
shipment  was  stopped  and  threatened  with 
confiscation.  I  laboured  for  some  time 
with  the  officers,  explaining  to  what  an  inno 
cent  and  even  beneficial  use  the  dangerous 
article  was  to  be  put  and  urging  them  at 
least  to  seize  that  and  sink  it  in  the  Bospho- 
rus  and  let  the  rest  of  the  medicines  go  on 
to  their  destination.  Suddenly,  as  I  thought 
I  was  on  the  point  of  success,  the  customs 
official,  with  whom  I  had  been  labouring, 
was  succeeded  by  another.  He  took  up 
the  matter  de  novo.  As  though  nothing 
had  been  said  he  sent  me  a  note,  informing 
me  of  the  arrival  of  this  shipment  of  medi 
cines,  saying  the  duty  paid  on  it  was  so 
much,  but  that  the  fine  on  the  acid  was  so 
much  more,  and  he  would  thank  me  for  a 
cheque  for  this  excess  and  that  the  whole 
shipment  had  been  confiscated.  So  I  had 
to  start  all  over  again,  and  take  as  many 
more  weeks  to  secure  the  release. 

One  comical  case  occurred.  Robert  Col 
lege  had  appointed  a  young  graduate  of 
an  American  college  to  teach  the  Oriental 
boys  not  only  some  branch  of  book  learning 
but  also  the  American  game  of  base  ball. 
In  examining  his  baggage,  the  custom  offi 
cers  came  upon  a  pitcher's  mask.  "What 
[205] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

is  this?"  they  asked  themselves.  "Some 
new  kind  of  revolutionary  weapon?  "  They 
detained  it  as  a  strangely  suspected  article. 
After  a  week's  deliberation  and  full  explana 
tion  by  the  American  consul  it  was  per 
mitted  to  enter. 

The  Sultan  watched  with  much  interest 
the  events  of  our  war  with  Spain  and 
especially  the  naval  contests.  He  asked 
me  many  questions  about  them.  Finally 
he  inquired  if  I  could  tell  him  how  he  could 
procure  some  ships  like  ours  without  the 
intervention  of  middle  men,  who  were  so 
given  to  cheating  him  in  contracts.  I  told 
him  that  the  builder  of  the  "Oregon," 
which  had  performed  its  wonderful  feat  of 
coming  round  Cape  Horn  and  going  di 
rectly  into  action,  was  then  in  St.  Peters 
burg,  and  if  he  desired,  I  would  ask  him  by 
telegraph  to  come  to  Constantinople  and 
confer  with  him.  I  endeavoured  to  impress 
him  with  the  belief  that  very  much  of  our 
success  depended  on  the  man  behind  the 
gun.  His  mind  was  evidently  turned  more 
to  our  cannon  than  to  our  men.  He  said 
he  had  ordered  some  of  the  cannon.  It  is 
well  known  that  he  did  finally  order  an 
ironclad  of  the  Cramps  of  Philadelphia. 

In  this  connection  I  may  mention  a  sin 
gular  fact  about  the  attitude  of  the  middle- 
[206] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

class  Turks  towards  us  in  the  Spanish  War. 
The  sympathies  in  most  of  the  Embassies, 
except  the  British,  were  rather  against  us, 
though  they  were  never  manifested  to  me 
in  an  unpleasant  way.  The  newspapers 
published  in  Constantinople,  except  one 
edited  by  a  Frenchman,  were  rather  un 
friendly  to  us.  That  one  I  kept  well  in 
formed  of  our  views.  But  rather  to  my 
surprise  I  found  that  the  main  body  of  the 
Turks  in  the  capital  leaned  to  our  side.  I 
was  puzzled  to  know  why.  Therefore  I 
asked  a  friend  who  was  familiar  with  the 
Turkish  language  and  with  many  of  the 
people  to  ascertain  the  cause  of  their  atti 
tude.  "Why,"  they  said  to  him,  "don't 
you  remember  that  three  hundred  years  ago 
these  Spaniards  drove  the  Mohammedans 
out  of  their  land?  Allah  is  great.  The  time 
of  punishment  for  them  has  come,"  Not 
improbably  the  Sultan  shared  their  feelings. 
At  the  outbreak  of  the  war  I  asked  him 
if  he  proposed  to  publish  a  proclamation  of 
neutrality.  He  said  he  would  follow  the 
example  of  other  nations  and  that  the  Great 
Powers  guaranteed  the  neutrality  of  the 
Dardanelles  at  all  times.  I  asked  how 
about  furnishing  munitions.  "Oh,"  he  re 
plied,  "everyone  knows  we  never  spare  so 
much  as  a  pistol." 

[207] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

It  will  be  remembered  that  the  Spaniards 
sent  some  ships  of  war  as  far  as  Port  Said, 
on  the  way  to  Manila.  They  could  not 
proceed  farther  without  procuring  coal. 
Tewfik  Pasha  asked  me  what  international 
law  required  of  his  government  about  allow 
ing  the  Spanish  ships  to  coal.  Of  course 
I  told  him  his  duty  was  to  allow  them  to 
take  coal  to  return  home  but  not  to  go  on. 
The  Spanish  ships  returned  home.  I  have 
always  supposed  he  knew  the  law  without 
asking  me.  But  I  am  not  quite  certain 
about  it. 

As  I  have  spoken  with  emphasis  of  the 
dilatoriness  of  the  Turkish  government,  I 
may  properly  credit  them  with  commend 
able  promptness  in  one  case.  During  the 
war  with  Greece  the  lights  on  the  Turkish 
coast  were  extinguished  to  prevent  the 
Greek  war  ships  from  approaching.  In 
December,  1897,  after  the  close  of  the  war, 
the  United  States  gun-boat,  the  Bancroft, 
was  coming  from  Athens  into  the  port  of 
Smyrna  in  the  evening.  The  captain  saw 
the  outer  light  at  the  mouth  of  the  harbour 
burning,  and  so  concluded  that  the  port 
was  open  at  night  and  kept  on  his  way. 
As  he  was  passing  a  small  fort  on  an 
island  in  the  harbour,  he  was  fired  on  by 
musketry  without  any  notice.  He  stopped 
[208] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

his  engines  and  sent  a  boat  with  an  officer 
towards  the  fort,  and  the  boat  was  fired  on. 
The  Bancroft  anchored  till  daylight  and 
then  proceeded  into  the  harbour  and  re 
ported  to  Admiral  Selfridge,  who  was  there 
with  the  war  ships,  the  Brooklyn  and  the 
Olympia.  The  Admiral  made  his  com 
plaint  to  the  governor,  who  referred  him  to 
Constantinople.  He  sent  a  despatch  to  me 
and  with  it  one  of  the  bullets  which  had 
fallen  on  the  deck  of  the  Bancroft. 

I  at  once  sent  a  spirited  despatch  to 
Tewfik  Pasha,  demanding  an  apology  and 
the  punishment  of  the  officers  of  the  fort 
at  Smyrna.  The  Imperial  Council  met  the 
next  day  and  decided  to  meet  all  my  de 
mands  and  to  dismiss  the  officers  at  fault. 
The  Admiral  expressed  himself  as  satisfied, 
and  the  affair  was  ended. 

Whether  action  would  have  been  so 
prompt  if  our  ships  under  Admiral  Selfridge 
had  npt  been  lying  at  Smyrna  I  cannot 
say,  but  I  doubt  it.  Unhappily  perhaps 
for  some  other  business  in  my  hands,  owing 
to  the  outbreak  of  the  Spanish  War  the 
Olympia  was  just  then  sent  through  the 
Suez  Canal  to  Manila,  where  she  had  a 
part  in  achieving  Dewey's  notable  victory, 
and  the  Brooklyn  was  ordered  home  for 
duty  on  this  side  of  the  sea. 
[209] 

15 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

My  belief  is  that  if  Selfridge  could  have 
remained  at  Smyrna  with  those  vessels, 
our  claims  against  the  Turkish  government 
would  without  great  delay  and  without  the 
firing  of  a  gun  have  been  settled.  When 
I  was  asked  to  go  to  the  East,  largely  for 
the  purpose  of  procuring  a  settlement  of  our 
claims,  with  my  knowledge  of  Oriental 
ways  I  asked,  and  the  President  promised, 
that  the  vessels  should  be  ordered  to  the 
Turkish  coast.  These  claims  were  chiefly 
for  the  destruction  of  the  property  of  Ameri 
can  missions  by  Turkish  soldiers.  As  they 
were  under  the  control  of  the  government, 
and  in  a  legal  sense  its  agents,  and  the 
property  for  which  restitution  was  asked 
was  destroyed  not  by  rioters  but  by  them, 
the  responsibility  of  the  government  could 
not  be  denied.  In  fact,  when  I  presented 
this  argument  to  Tewfik  Pasha,  the  Secre 
tary  of  Foreign  Affairs,  he  did  not  and  could 
not  deny  its  validity.  On  the  contrary,  he 
told  my  dragoman  that  they  would  will 
ingly  settle  our  claims  were  it  not  for  the 
embarrassment  caused  by  the  larger  claims 
of  the  other  nations.  When  the  Great 
Powers  were  in  conference  they  decided  to 
present  their  claims  not  jointly  but  sepa 
rately,  in  notes  substantially  identical.  The 
various  Ambassadors  assured  me  that  they 
[210] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

were  quite  willing  I  should  present  ours  at 
once  and  one  of  them  said  he  should  be  very 
glad  if  we  succeeded  in  collecting  without 
delay.  With  the  outbreak  of  the  Spanish 
War  and  the  withdrawal  of  our  vessels,  the 
Foreign  Office  relegated  the  question  to  the 
limits  of  indefinite  discussion  and  procras 
tination,  which  lasted  beyond  my  term  of 
service.  A  settlement  of  the  claims  was 
finally  made  after  some  years  more  of  delay, 
by  adding  the  sum  due  to  a  contract  price 
for  the  construction  of  a  ship  of  war  by  the 
Cramps,  this  excess  to  be  turned  over  by 
the  builders  to  the  mission  board  whose 
property  had  been  destroyed. 

The  resort  to  espionage  was  a  most  seri 
ous  blot  upon  the  administration.  The 
spies  of  the  Sultan  were  everywhere.  One 
Turk  said  to  me  the  spy  business  was  the 
most  prosperous  of  any.  I  was  assured 
that  spies  were  sitting  at  the  dinner  tables 
of  the  principal  hotels,  to  overhear  the  con 
versation  of  the  guests.  With  one  against 
whose  visits  I  had  been  warned  I  had  an 
amusing  adventure.  He  was  a  handsome, 
dignified  Arab,  who  had  been  in  England 
long  enough  to  talk  English  fairly  well. 
He  introduced  himself  to  me,  saying  he  had 
been  Mayor  of  Jerusalem  and  was  now  try 
ing  to  procure  from  the  government  a  con- 
[211] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

cession  for  the  construction  of  a  system  of 
waterworks  for  that  city.  He  regretted,  he 
informed  me,  to  find  that  the  government 
was  so  corrupt  that  he  had  no  hope  of  secur 
ing  his  concession  except  by  bribing  a  whole 
row  of  high  officials.  It  was  refreshing  to 
him  to  turn  aside  from  these  representatives 
of  a  corrupt  and  tyrannical  government  and 
pay  his  respects  to  the  representative  of  a 
pure  and  honest  democracy. 

Supposing  his  object  to  be  to  draw  from 
me  some  remark  derogatory  to  the  Sultan, 
which  he  could  report  to  my  disadvantage, 
I  ventured  to  remark  that  a  monarchy  pre 
sided  over  by  a  just  sovereign  was  an  edify 
ing  spectacle  and  that  even  in  republics 
there  were  found  sometimes  corrupt  men  in 
office.  He  seemed  surprised  at  my  remarks 
and  proceeded  to  eulogize  republican  gov 
ernments.  I  continued  my  commendations 
of  enlightened  monarchies.  The  conversa 
tion  ran  on  in  this  way  *  for  half  an  hour, 
when  he  bade  me  adieu,  but  as  I  flattered 
myself  without  any  game  for  his  bag. 

The  venality  of  some  of  the  courts  was 
also  a  fearful  weakness  in  the  government. 
I  asked  one  of  the  best  lawyers,  an  English 
man  who  had  been  practising  twenty  years 
in  Constantinople,  whether  the  courts  had 
improved  in  his  time.  "They  have  de- 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

cidedly  grown  worse,"  was  his  reply.  He 
then  gave  me  the  following  illustration  from 
his  recent  experience: 

"I  was  counsel  for  a  Liverpool  merchant 
to  collect  a  sum  due  him  from  an  Armenian 
merchant  here  for  a  bill  of  goods.  Not 
long  after  the  trial  began  I  saw  evidence 
that  one  of  the  judges  had  been  bribed  by 
the  defendants.  I  asked  and  procured 
his  dismissal  from  the  bench.  Another 
man  was  appointed  and  the  trial  was  re 
sumed.  After  a  little  I  ascertained  that 
this  man  was  bought  up  by  the  defendants. 
I  arrested  proceedings  and  asked  for  the 
removal  of  the  new  judge.  Thereupon  the 
Armenian  came  to  me  and  offered  to  settle 
for  half  the  face  of  the  bill.  "But  why," 
asked  my  informant,  "do  you  ask  me  to 
accept  half  the  sum  due?  You  know  you 
owe  the  whole."  "Oh,  well,"  replied  the 
merchant,  "but  it  has  cost  me  half  the 
amount  of  the  bill  to  buy  these  two  judges." 

Some  of  the  religious  ceremonies  one 
sees  in  Constantinople  are  of  much  interest. 

On  January  9,  we  went  to  the  Yildiz  to 
see  the  Pilgrims  start  for  Mecca  with 
gifts.  A  Mohammedan  acquires  much 
merit  by  making  the  journey.  The  streets 
leading  to  the  scene  were  lined  with  people. 
The  concourse  of  women  was  exceptionally 
[213] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

large.  Dropped  down  on  the  grassy  banks, 
wearing  their  white  wraps,  they  resembled 
a  flock  of  pigeons.  As  we  looked  on,  a  long 
procession  of  venerable  ulemas  poured  forth 
from  the  mosque,  where  they  had  been  to 
worship.  They  wore  robes  of  every  shade 
of  green  and  a  gilt  band  around  the  turban. 
The  procession  was  headed  by  several 
camels  and  by  a  larger  number  of  donkeys, 
laden  with  the  gifts.  Most  of  these  gifts 
were  covered  by  canopies  of  multi-coloured 
stuffs.  But  the  last  donkeys  carried  just 
such  old  hair-covered  trunks  as  I  used  to 
see  in  the  country  in  Rhode  Island  in  my 
boyhood.  As  the  procession  started,  a 
sham  fight  was  carried  on,  representing  an 
attack  on  the  caravan,  but  a  few  brave 
Moslems  successfully  defended  it.  The  old 
priests  with  much  difficulty  and  considerable 
boosting  mounted  horses,  each  of  which 
was  led,  and  closed  the  procession.  The 
day  was  perfect.  The  wild  Arab  music, 
the  real  or  simulated  enthusiasm  of  the  de 
fenders  of  the  caravan,  the  gay  trappings 
of  the  camels,  the  large  concourse  of  the 
faithful,  all  made  a  fine  Oriental  pageant 
of  semi-barbaric  nature.  It  is  however 
always  well  understood  that  the  procession 
will  not  march  overland  to  Mecca,  but  will 
be  borne  by  steamer  to  Arabia. 
[214] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

On  May  2,  we  attended  the  reception  by 
the  Sultan  of  the  high  religious  and  civic 
officials.  This  is  held  in  the  great  hall  of 
the  Dolmar-batsche  Palace.  The  diplo 
matic  visitors,  including  the  ladies,  occupied 
the  gallery.  We  were  asked  to  be  present 
at  half -past  six  in  the  morning.  The  Sultan 
sacrifices  a  sheep  but  not  in  our  presence. 
The  ceremony  began  by  the  Sheik-ul-Islam 
approaching  His  Majesty  and  receiving  a 
kiss  on  his  shoulder.  Then  priests  of  high 
rank  came  forward  and  kissed  the  hem  of 
the  Sultan's  coat.  Those  of  lower  rank 
kissed  a  tassel  fastened  to  the  Sultan  by 
a  gilt  band  and  held  by  Osman  Pasha. 
These  and  the  civil  officers  all  wore  their 
official  dress.  The  Sultan  extended  his 
hand  a  little  as  if  to  seem  to  lift  up  most 
of  the  priests  from  their  bowing  position. 
But  in  recognition  of  the  salaams  of  the 
other  officials  he  made  not  the  slightest 
response  by  movement  or  gesture.  A  band 
played  in  the  gallery  during  the  whole 
ceremony.  Tea,  cakes,  and  fruits  were 
served  to  us  visitors  during  the  long  and 
rather  monotonous  ceremony.  Munir 
Pasha,  the  Sultan's  interpreter,  came  at 
the  close  to  thank  us. 

I  attended  a  remarkable  and  rather  re 
pulsive  ceremony  of  the  Persians  at  their 
[2151 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

Khan.  They  are  known  as  the  Shiite 
branch  of  Mohammedans.  They  believe 
that  All,  the  son-in-law  of  Mohammed,  was 
crowded  out  of  the  caliphate  by  his  rivals 
for  years  and  his  son  Hassein  was  mur 
dered  by  them.  Annually  they  have  this 
celebration  in  honour  of  Hassein.  The  ex 
citement  is  so  great  on  the  occasion  that 
not  unfrequently  scenes  of  violence  are 
witnessed.  On  this  account  it  was  not 
deemed  prudent  for  me  to  take  my  wife 
with  me. 

It  was  already  dark  when  I  arrived.  The 
place  was  brilliantly  lighted.  Round  and 
round  the  building  in  the  centre  of  the 
square,  which  is  bordered  by  houses  and 
shops  of  Persians,  the  procession  marched 
from  sunset  till  about  10  o'clock.  It  con 
sisted  of  three  principal  sections  of  about 
sixty  or  seventy  persons  in  each.  One  was 
made  up  of  men  beating  their  breasts  as 
they  marched  before  what  seemed  to  repre 
sent  a  turbeh  or  tomb  of  Hassein,  and  re- 
sponsively  shouting  something  about  him. 
Another  section  carried  chains  with  which 
they  flagellated  their  bare  shoulders.  The 
third  section  carried  swords.  They  were 
clad  in  white  cotton  gowns,  and  as  they 
marched  and  shouted  they  cut  their  scalps 
and  faces  with  their  swords  till  their  necks 
[216] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

and  gowns  were  saturated  with  blood.  One 
child  five  years  old,  riding  a  horse,  did  the 
same,  and  I  even  saw  an  infant  in  arms 
with  a  knife  and  its  face  and  head  appar 
ently  slashed.  This  last  section  grew  more 
and  more  excited  as  the  evening  wore  on. 
From  time  to  time  men  became  so  weak 
that  they  were  led  away  to  be  washed  and 
cared  for.  Near  the  close  of  the  evening 
one  man  appeared  to  be  raving  crazy. 
There  were  musicians,  flag  bearers  and  light 
bearers  in  the  procession. 

I  understand  the  demonstration  to  be  one 
of  grief  for  the  death  of  Hassein  and  also 
of  penance.  Many  of  the  Persian  by 
standers  wept  and  some  sobbed  aloud.  In 
the  houses  adjacent,  groups  of  Persians 
were  looking  on  in  gravity.  Some  of  them 
were  weeping,  some  were  partaking  of 
refreshments. 

The  Turkish  soldiers  were  present  in 
force  to  keep  order.  One  might  well  be 
lieve  that  otherwise  these  frantic  zealots 
would  run  amuck  on  the  Giaours  present. 
I  was  told  that  in  Persia  the  demonstra 
tions  on  such  an  occasion  were  more  violent. 

My  wife  and  I  frequently  visited  the  Insti 
tutions,  of  which  Americans  may  justly  feel 
proud  —  Robert  College  and  the  Woman's 
College.  The  former  was  established  by 
[217] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

* 

that  gifted  missionary  Cyrus  Hamlin,  en 
dowed  largely  by  Mr.  Christopher  Robert, 
of  New  York,  and  administered  for  so  many 
years  by  Rev.  Dr.  George  Washburn.  It 
gave  a  good  collegiate  education  of  the 
American  type  to  a  large  number  of  Arme 
nian,  Bulgarian  and  Greek  students,  and 
thus  incidentally  imbued  them  with  the 
Christian  spirit  of  regulated  liberty.  Sev 
eral  of  the  men  most  prominent  in  develop 
ing  the  civic  life  of  Bulgaria  were  graduates 
of  the  college.  Perhaps  no  foreigner  in  the 
Empire  was  so  well  informed  about  the 
political  condition  of  South-eastern  Europe 
as  President  Washburn.  So  highly  was  his 
opinion  valued  by  the  British  government 
that  he  rarely  passed  through  England  with 
out  being  asked  by  the  Premier  or  the 
Foreign  Secretary  for  an  interview.  A  few 
Turkish  students  were  in  the  college  classes, 
but  owing  to  the  attitude  of  the  Imperial 
authorities  not  many  ventured  to  attend. 
English  was  the  language  of  instruction  in 
both  colleges,  though  the  eastern  languages 
were  taught. 

The  Woman's  College  had  girls  of  the 
same  nationalities  as  Robert  College.  Oc 
casionally  a  Turkish  girl  was  sent  there  by 
her  parents.  On  one  occasion  I  attended  a 
class  in  English  Literature.  It  happened 
[218] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

that  the  subject  on  that  day  was  Long 
fellow's  "Evangeline."  I  was  surprised  at 
the  command  of  our  language  by  these 
Oriental  girls,  and  especially  by  the  fact 
that  the  most  proficient  was  a  Turkish  girl, 
the  daughter  of  a  Turkish  official  in  the 
Treasury  Department.  I  was  told  that  she 
had  entertained  her  father  in  his  leisure 
hours  by  translating  at  sight  to  him  pas 
sages  from  Shakespeare  and  from  Holmes' 
"Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table."  She 
had  translated  into  Turkish  an  American 
book,  "Abbott's  Mother  at  Home,"  if  I 
remember  the  title  correctly,  a  work  in 
tended  to  instruct  mothers  in  rearing  their 
children,  and  her  proud  father  had  incurred 
the  expense  of  printing  it  and  distributing 
a  thousand  copies  among  the  soldiers  re 
turning  from  the  Greek  War.  It  is  an 
interesting  fact  that  this  Woman's  College 
owes  its  imperial  authorization  to  Admiral 
Farragut.  It  had  long  been  asked  for  in 
vain.  He  was  informed  of  this  on  his 
visit.  When  he  was  received  by  the  Sultan, 
in  the  friendly  conversation  of  their  inter 
view,  he  asked  the  Emperor  to  give  the 
college  the  sanction  of  an  irade  and  his 
request  was  granted. 

The   summer  of   1898   we   spent   in   the 
island  of  Prinkipo,  in  the  spacious  mansion 
[219] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

of  Mr.  Azarian,  and  with  our  launch  made 
many  beautiful  excursions  to  the  adjacent 
islands  and  to  the  main  land. 

On  July  4,  we  invited  all  the  Americans 
in  Constantinople  and  all  the  members  of 
the  British  embassy.  One  of  the  British 
gun-boats  was  placed  at  the  service  of  the 
Americans  living  on  the  Upper  Bosphorus, 
so  that  our  company  numbered  about  sixty. 
We  pinned  little  American  flags  on  all,  British 
and  Americans  indiscriminately,  and  had  a 
merry  celebration.  Unhappily  the  news  of 
the  capture  of  Cervera's  fleet  did  not  reach 
us  until  the  next  day  and  even  then  was 
denied  at  the  Spanish  Legation. 

One  day  we  went  to  Bulwer's  Island, 
some  seven  miles  away  from  Prinkipo.  It 
is  named  after  Sir  Henry  Lytton  Bulwer, 
who  negotiated  with  us  in  1850  the  noted 
Clayton-Bulwer  Treaty.  He  built  here  two 
castles  of  stone  in  Norman  style.  Earth 
quakes  have  made  ruins  of  them,  though 
one  can  see  the  elaborate  carved  decora 
tions  of  the  doorways  and  windows.  It  is 
said  that  his  life  here  was  of  such  a  char 
acter  as  to  lead  to  his  recall  and  caused  Lord 
Palmerston  to  give  his  successor  the  advice 
"Beware  of  Islands." 

The  adventure  of  an  English  neighbour 
of  mine  on  Prinkipo  is  perhaps  worth  re- 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

lating.  Long  resident  in  Constantinople, 
he  had  been  an  anonymous  correspondent 
of  a  London  newspaper,  through  which  he 
made  known  to  the  public  many  facts  con 
cerning  the  Turkish  government,  which  the 
Sultan  preferred  not  to  have  proclaimed. 
The  tidings  came  to  my  friend  that  the 
Sultan  was  preparing  to  banish  him  from 
the  country.  He  had  large  interests  in 
Constantinople  which  made  it  very  unde 
sirable  for  him  to  leave.  He  bethought 
himself  of  this  device. 

He  sent  for  an  influential  Turkish  official 
to  whom  he  had  once  rendered  an  important 
service  and  who  had  promised  to  reciprocate 
the  service  if  opportunity  ever  presented 
itself.  He  said  to  his  friend,  "I  am  think 
ing  of  going  to  England,  and  running  for 
Parliament.  I  know  of  a  district  in  which 
I  can  be  elected."  His  friend  besought  him 
to  remain,  but  immediately  went  away  and 
spread  the  news  among  the  officials  at  the 
Palace.  They  saw  that  in  Parliament  he 
could  do  much  more  harm  than  in  Con 
stantinople.  Nothing  more  was  heard  of 
the  scheme  to  banish  him. 

Since  during  the  great  fast  of  Ramazan 
it  is  impracticable  to  transact  important 
business  with  the  Turkish  government,  my 
wife  and  I  left  Constantinople  on  January 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

26,  1898,  on  my  sixty  days'  leave  for  a 
journey  to  Egypt  and  the  Holy  Land.  We 
went  up  the  Nile  to  Philae,  spent  several 
days  in  Cairo,  then  went  to  Joppa  and  Jeru 
salem,  to  Jericho  and  Hebron,  to  Beirut, 
where  we  visited  the  American  College  as 
the  guests  of  President  Bliss,  to  Baalbec 
and  Damascus,  calling  on  the  way  home  at 
Smyrna  and  making  an  excursion  to  Ephe- 
sus,  finally  reaching  Constantinople  on 
March  23.  At  every  town  which  we  visited 
in  the  Holy  Land,  the  governors  and  mili 
tary  and  civic  officials,  in  obedience  to  the 
Sultan's  orders,  welcomed  us  on  our  arrival, 
and  during  our  stay  rendered  us  any  assist 
ance  in  their  power. 

One  of  the  most  agreeable  excursions  we 
made  while  in  Turkey  was  to  Broussa  in 
fine  days  in  May.  The  situation  is  most 
picturesque  on  heights  from  which  one 
looks  over  a  wide  expanse  of  fertile  valleys 
to  the  Sea  of  Marmora.  Here  Osman,  the 
founder  of  the  Empire,  planted  himself. 
Here  are  his  tomb  and  the  tombs  of  some 
of  his  successors.  Here  Pliny  the  younger 
was  praetor,  and  here  he  wrote  some  of  his 
letters  which  have  come  down  to  us.  While 
we  were  there,  a  regiment  which  belonged 
to  Broussa  and  the  neighbourhood  re 
turned  from  the  Greek  War.  The  streets 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

were  crowded  with  men,  women  and  chil 
dren.  We  expected  to  hear  the  soldiers 
greeted  with  cheers.  To  our  surprise,  not 
a  sound  of  a  voice  was  heard.  The  march 
of  these  stalwart  and  sun-burned  warriors, 
returning  from  a  triumphant  campaign,  was 
made  through  the  principal  street  in  dead 
silence  everywhere.  I  inquired  what  was 
the  explanation  of  this  strange  scene.  I 
was  told  that  the  government  had  never  sent 
home  or  allowed  to  be  sent  home  during 
the  war  any  tidings  concerning  these  men. 
Consequently  the  relatives  were  waiting  in 
anxiety  now  to  see  who,  if  any,  were  miss 
ing.  In  this  suspense  there  was  no  impulse 
to  cheer.  Those  who  were  rejoiced  to  see 
their  kindred  returning  were  restrained 
from  a  public  demonstration  by  a  delicate 
regard  for  the  feelings  of  those  to  whom  the 
day  brought  disappointment  and  sorrow. 
This  explanation  made  the  spectacle  very 
pathetic. 

I  had  an  interview  with  the  Acting  Gov 
ernor-General  Halib  Ibrahim  Bey.  He  had 
been  Vali  at  Sivas  at  the  time  of  the  mas 
sacres  and  had  been  removed  on  the  demand 
of  the  British  Ambassador.  But  he  now 
talked  to  me  in  the  most  liberal  spirit  of 
leaving  freedom  to  all  as  far  as  possible. 
He  sent  the  military  commandant  and  his 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

dragoman  two  miles  out  to  meet  me  on  my 
arrival  and  a  squad  of  cavalry  all  the  way 
to  the  sea  on  my  return. 

On  August  5,  I  had  my  farewell  audience 
with  the  Sultan.  He  talked  mainly  on  our 
war  with  Spain,  and  asked  me  to  request 
our  Secretary  of  the  Navy  to  commend  to 
him  some  ship-building  firms  with  whom  he 
could  deal  directly.  He  thanked  me  for 
having  maintained  so  cordial  relations  with 
him. 

On  August  13,  we  embarked  on  an  Aus 
trian  steamer  for  Trieste.  Some  forty  or 
fifty  of  our  friends,  missionaries,  teachers, 
and  diplomats  gathered  at  the  wharf  to 
bid  us  adieu.  Our  Turkish  coachman  and 
servants  evinced  much  feeling.  It  was  not 
without  emotion  that  we  parted  with  our 
faithful  servants  and  our  numerous  friends. 


[224] 


THE  PRESIDENCY  OF  THE  UNI 
VERSITY  OF  MICHIGAN 

IN  1869,  to  my  surprise  I  was  invited  to 
visit  the  University  of  Michigan  and  de 
cide  whether  I  would  accept  the  presidency 
of  the  institution  which  Dr.  Haven  had 
resigned.  My  wife  accompanied  me,  and 
we  spent  two  or  three  days  at  Ann  Arbor. 
We  were  much  impressed  with  the  vigour 
and  the  promise  of  the  University.  But  on 
returning  to  Burlington,  I  found  that  the 
men  who  had  rallied  generously  to  the  sup 
port  of  the  college  would  be  sorely  disap 
pointed  if  I  left  them  then.  I  decided  that 
it  was  my  duty  to  decline  the  invitation  to 
Michigan.  So  I  devoted  myself  with  all 
my  energy  to  the  continuance  of  my  work 
in  Vermont.  In  1871,  the  invitation  to 
Michigan  was  renewed  with  much  earnest 
ness.  I  felt  that  I  had  discharged  my  duty 
to  my  Vermont  friends  and  that  the  college 
could  move  on  fairly  without  me.  I  had 
some  hesitation  about  undertaking  so  large 
a  responsibility  as  that  at  Michigan.  One 
day  when  I  mentioned  this  to  a  friend  who 


16 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

had  very  large  business  interests,  he  said, 
"I  have  found  if  you  have  a  long  lever  it  is 
as  easy  to  raise  a  large  load  as  to  lift  a  small 
weight  with  a  short  lever." 

After  careful  consideration  I  decided  to 
accept  the  invitation  to  Michigan.  In 
compliance  with  the  request  of  the  Regents 
of  the  University,  I  attended  the  Com 
mencement  at  Ann  Arbor  on  June  28,  1871, 
and  delivered  my  Inaugural.  I  then  re 
turned  to  Burlington  and  finished  the 
academic  year  which  terminated  on  August 
3.  I  removed  to  Ann  Arbor  with  my 
family  early  in  September. 

I  found  that  largely  under  the  influence 
of  John  D.  Pierce,  Superintendent  of  Public 
Instruction  at  the  time  of  its  organization, 
of  Isaac  E.  Crary,  and  of  Henry  P.  Tappan, 
its  first  President,  the  University  had  been 
inspired  to  a  considerable  extent  by  Ger 
man  ideals  of  education  and  was  shaped 
under  broader  and  more  generous  views  of 
university  life  than  most  of  the  eastern 
colleges.  Mr.  Pierce,  a  graduate  of  Brown 
University  in  the  class  of  1822,  was  settled 
as  a  Presbyterian  Home  Missionary  in 
Marshall.  Mr.  Isaac  E.  Crary,  a  gradu 
ate  of  Trinity  College,  Hartford,  was  a 
lawyer  in  the  same  town.  Both  were  much 
interested  in  public  education.  Mr.  Pierce 
[226] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

was  appointed  the  State  Superintendent  of 
Public  Instruction,  the  first  officer  with  that 
title  in  the  United  States.  Mr.  Crary  was 
a  member  of  the  Convention  that  framed  the 
State  Constitution  of  1835,  and  as  Chair 
man  of  the  Committee  on  Education 
drafted  the  Article  on  Education  in  the 
Constitution.  Cousin's  famous  Report  on 
Public  Instruction  in  Prussia  had  fallen 
into  the  hands  of  Mr.  Pierce  and  formed 
the  subject  of  much  discussion  between 
him  and  his  neighbour,  Mr.  Crary.  Mr. 
Pierce  told  me  that  he  could  take  me  in  a 
grove  in  Marshall  to  the  very  log  on  which 
they  often  sat  and  conferred  together  on 
this  remarkable  book,  which  gave  them  the 
idea  of  a  state  system  of  schools  with  a 
university  at  its  head.  That  idea  gave 
shape  to  the  constitutional  Article  on  Edu 
cation  and  to  the  legislation  afterwards 
enacted  in  accordance  with  it.  When  Dr. 
Tappan  was  made  President  in  1852,  he 
brought  from  Germany,  where  he  had 
studied,  ideals  quite  in  harmony  with  those 
which  Pierce  and  Crary  had  cherished  at 
the  outset,  and  with  his  vigorous  mind  he 
left  a  deep  impression  on  the  life  and  spirit 
of  the  University.  The  Institution  had 
in  its  Faculties  at  the  time  of  my  arrival 
men  of  marked  ability.  I  will  name  some 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

of  the  more  prominent  of  the  professors 
who  are  no  longer  living. 

Dr.  Henry  S.  Frieze,  Professor  of  Latin, 
for  the  two  years  prior  to  my  coming  Act 
ing  President,  was  a  man  of  rare  qualities, 
a  passionate  lover  of  art  and  of  music,  a 
scholar  of  large  and  varied  attainments 
and  of  the  finest  literary  taste,  an  inspiring 
teacher  and  a  most  winsome  spirit.  His 
influence  on  students  and  on  his  colleagues, 
in  fostering  the  love  of  classical  learning 
and  in  the  diffusion  of  high  and  broad 
university  ideals  through  all  the  West, 
causes  his  memory  to  be  cherished  with 
peculiar  respect  and  affection. 

Rev.  Dr.  Benjamin  F.  Cocker,  Professor 
of  Philosophy,  had  had  a  romantic  life. 
A  Methodist  circuit  preacher  in  York 
shire  in  early  life,  he  lived  for  years  among 
the  miners  in  Australia.  On  his  voyage 
from  that  country  he  was  wrecked  on  an 
island  in  the  Pacific,  inhabited  partly  by 
savages.  After  a  narrow  escape  with  his 
family  he  arrived  in  this  State  in  utter  des 
titution.  Assigned  to  the  care  of  a  small 
country  church,  his  talent  soon  made  him 
known  and  secured  his  call  to  important 
churches,  and  finally  to  the  chair  in  the 
University.  His  opportunities  for  gaining 
an  education  had  been  slender,  but  by  his 
[228] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

marked  ability  and  his  great  industry  he 
had  overcome  in  large  degree  the  limitations 
of  his  earlier  years,  though  he  never  ceased 
to  lament  them.  Both  as  a  preacher  and  a 
teacher  he  had  a  singular  charm  of  voice 
and  manner  which,  added  to  his  clearness 
and  simplicity  in  discussions  of  the  prob 
lems  of  philosophy,  made  his  instructions 
a  delight  to  his  pupils.  He  is  remembered 
by  them  with  abiding  affection  and  grati 
tude. 

Edward  Olney,  Professor  of  Mathematics, 
also  had  a  unique  history.  He  was  never 
in  school  but  a  few  weeks.  Of  mathe 
matics  he  seemed  to  have  from  childhood 
an  intuitive  comprehension.  His  geometry 
he  learned  while  following  the  plough.  He 
drew  the  figures  with  chalk  on  the  plough 
beam  and  mastered  the  demonstrations 
while  travelling  in  the  furrow.  Though 
probably  his  attainments  did  not  at  last 
reach  much  beyond  the  range  of  the  higher 
instruction  in  the  undergraduate  course,  he 
had  a  most  unusual  gift  as  a  teacher.  He 
not  only  made  his  instruction  simple  and 
clear,  but  what  is  not  common  in  colleges, 
he  made  the  study  of  mathematics  a  fa 
vourite  study  of  the  great  body  of  students. 
He  had  a  manly  frankness  and  honesty  of 
character  which  often  gave  to  his  expres- 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

sions  the  air  of  bluntness,  but  commanded 
the  highest  respect  of  his  pupils  and  culti 
vated  in  them  a  spirit  of  manliness  and 
honesty  kindred  to  his  own.  He  was  a  man 
of  most  earnest  religious  nature  and  was  a 
power  for  righteousness  both  in  college  and 
in  the  community. 

Charles  Kendall  Adams  was  Professor  of 
History.  He  had  acquired  his  enthusiasm 
for  historical  study  under  Andrew  D.  White, 
when  he  filled  the  Chair  of  History  in  this 
University.  Mr.  Adams  had  recently  re 
turned  from  study  in  Germany  where  he  had 
become  familiar  with  the  Seminar  method, 
in  introducing  which  he  afterwards  was 
the  pioneer  in  American  universities.  Mr. 
Adams  was  even  then  greatly  interested  in 
university  problems  and  was  carefully 
studying  all  experiments  in  university  ad 
ministration,  both  in  America  and  Europe. 
He  subsequently  made  good  use  of  his 
knowledge  of  universities  as  President  of 
Cornell  University  and  of  the  University 
of  Wisconsin. 

Moses  Coit  Tyler  was  Professor  of  Rhet 
oric  and  English  Literature.  He  was  al 
ready  master  of  that  attractive  style  which 
lent  such  a  charm  to  everything  that  he 
wrote  and  inspired  his  classes  with  a  love 
for  the  best  in  literature  and  for  purity  and 
[230] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

vivacity  in  their  essays  and  speeches.  In 
his  private  study  he  was  already  showing 
that  deep  interest  in  American  History  and 
the  early  American  authors  which  gave 
shape  and  colour  to  his  later  works.  He 
had  a  fine  sense  of  humour  which  enlivened 
his  instruction  and  made  him  a  most  agree 
able  companion. 

Alexander  Winchell,  like  Professors  of 
Science  in  most  American  colleges  at  that 
time,  was  giving  elementary  instruction  in 
Geology,  Zoology,  and  Botany,  but  by  his 
powerful  imagination  and  brilliant  elo 
quence  was  widely  known  as  one  of  the 
most  successful  popular  lecturers  on  science. 
He  was  afterwards  President  of  the  Syra 
cuse  University. 

James  C.  Watson,  Professor  of  Astron 
omy,  was  a  man  whose  mathematical  intu 
itions  were  near  to  genius.  The  son  of  an 
Irish  carpenter,  he  was  one  of  the  finest 
products  of  the  Michigan  System  of  Pub 
lic  Education,  for  he  received  his  entire 
training  in  the  public  schools  of  Ann  Arbor 
and  in  the  University.  While  he  was  yet 
a  student  he  made  a  telescope  and  with  it 
discovered  a  comet.  While  still  a  young 
man  he  discovered  asteroids  and  wrote  a 
text  book  on  Astronomy,  which  gave  him 
an  enviable  reputation  among  astronomers 
[231] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

here  and  in  Europe.  His  college  teachers 
said  that  as  a  student  he  was  almost  as  apt 
in  languages  as  in  mathematics,  and  if  he 
had  cultivated  them  as  a  profession,  might 
have  won  distinction  in  that  field.  He  had 
unlimited  capacity  for  work.  It  seemed  as 
though  he  could  observe  all  night  and  then 
study  all  day.  In  teaching  he  had  none  of 
the  methods  of  the  drill  master.  But  his 
lecture  or  his  talk  was  so  stimulating  that 
one  could  not  but  learn  and  love  to  learn 
by  listening.  I  have  heard  his  pupils  say 
that  sometimes  while  discussing  an  intri 
cate  problem  he  would  have  an  entirely 
new  demonstration  suddenly  flash  upon 
his  mind  as  by  inspiration  and  then  and 
there  he  would  write  it  out  upon  the 
blackboard. 

George  S.  Morris,  a  man  of  the  widest 
reading,  was  the  Professor  of  Modern  Lan 
guages.  He  had  already  translated  Ueber- 
weg's  History  of  Philosophy.  He  afterwards 
welcomed  the  opportunity  to  give  his  whole 
time  to  teaching  philosophy  here  and  in  the 
Johns  Hopkins  University,  leaving  in  both 
institutions  a  profound  impression  upon  his 
classes. 

Edward  L.  Walter  was  then  giving  in 
struction  in  Latin.  Later  he  had  charge 
of  the  work  in  German  and  in  the  Romance 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

Languages.  He  was  a  master  alike  of  an 
cient  and  modern  literatures.  Gifted  with 
remarkable  powers  of  acquisition,  he  was 
one  of  the  most  successful  of  teachers.  We 
were  robbed  of  him  while  in  the  prime  of  his 
strength  by  the  sinking  of  the  steamship 
Bourgogne. 

M.  L.  D'Ooge,  Professor  of  Greek,  was 
absent  in  Europe,  but  the  department  was 
in  the  hands  of  Elisha  Jones  and  Albert  H. 
Pattengill,  than  whom  better  classroom 
teachers  of  the  classics  were  to  be  found  in 
no  American  college. 

In  the  Medical  Department,  which  was 
crowded  with  over  five  hundred  students, 
were  Professor  Corydon  L.  Ford,  doubtless 
the  best  lecturer  in  the  country  on  anatomy, 
as  it  was  then  taught;  Dr.  Sager,  a  man  of 
large  scientific  attainments  for  his  time; 
Dr.  Palmer,  so  long  the  efficient  Dean;  Dr. 
Prescott,  the  distinguished  chemist,  and  a 
group  of  brilliant  younger  men. 

In  the  Law  Department  were  the  three 
great  teachers,  who  had  guided  its  fortunes 
from  its  foundation,  Thomas  M.  Cooley, 
James  V.  Campbell,  and  Charles  I.  Walker. 
Never  was  a  law  school  so  fortunate  as  this 
was  in  beginning  its  work  and  continuing 
it  for  so  many  years  under  such  gifted 
instructors.  Charles  A.  Kent,  a  worthy 
[  233  ] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

coadjutor,  had  recently  joined  them.  It 
was  not  strange  that  the  school  attracted 
students  from  all  parts  of  the  land. 

Professors  Cooley  and  Campbell  were  on 
the  Supreme  Bench  of  the  State.  The 
Court,  by  the  wisdom  of  its  decisions,  had 
already  won  the  highest  respect  of  the  legal 
profession  throughout  the  country.  Judge 
Cooley  had  also  won  renown  by  his  great 
work  on  Constitutional  Limitations.  He 
seemed  to  have  an  intuitive  perception  of 
legal  relations.  He  was  a  man  of  inde 
fatigable  industry.  Beyond  all  men  I  have 
known,  he  possessed  the  power  of  writing 
rapidly  and  with  such  accuracy  that  no 
reader  could  misunderstand  his  meaning. 

Judge  Campbell  was  a  scholarly  man  of 
wide  reading,  and  of  a  graceful  style  in 
writing  or  speaking.  He  was  most  familiar 
with  the  early  history  of  the  State  and  es 
pecially  with  the  customs  and  traditions  of 
the  French  population  of  Detroit  and  the 
vicinity.  His  narrations  of  the  details  of 
their  life  were  as  fascinating  as  those  of  the 
best  French  raconteurs.  His  lectures  on  law 
were  diffuse,  but  so  charming  in  manner, 
like  his  conversation,  that  they  held  the 
undivided  attention  of  his  students. 

Professor  Walker  was  so  lucid  and  me 
thodical  in  his  instruction  that  his  classes 
[234] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

always  testified  to  the  great  benefit  they 
received  from  him. 

It  will  be  seen  that  it  was  rather  remark 
able  that  a  University  so  young  as  this 
should  have  gathered  such  a  company  of 
teachers.  It  was  indeed  a  stimulating  body 
for  me  to  be  associated  with  in  my  arduous 
and  responsible  duties. 

On  my  arrival  I  was  sadly  disappointed 
to  find  that  my  former  teacher  and  old 
friend,  Dr.  Frieze,  at  whose  suggestion  I 
had  been  chosen  President,  had  gone  to 
Europe  for  a  prolonged  visit.  I  had  relied 
on  him  to  give  me  full  information  about 
the  details  of  the  Institution  and  to  assist 
me  with  his  wise  counsels.  But  I  received 
a  warm  welcome  from  the  Faculties  and  the 
students.  During  the  first  few  weeks,  I 
attended  classes  to  observe  the  methods 
and  the  quality  of  the  teaching.  I  found 
the  instruction  was  for  the  most  part  excel 
lent.  In  both  the  colleges  with  which  I  had 
been  connected,  we  had  a  marking  system 
for  recording  the  quality  of  the  students' 
recitations.  Here  I  found  none.  I  was 
naturally  interested  to  observe  whether 
without  such  a  system  students  could  be 
held  to  a  proper  standard  of  work.  When, 
after  six  weeks'  attendance  on  classes,  I 
heard  only  two  students  say  "not  pre- 
1235] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

pared,"  I  was  forced  to  the  conclusion  that 
as  good  results  were  secured  without  as  with 
a  marking  system.  Prolonged  observation 
in  later  years  has  confirmed  that  belief, 
although  probably  higher  technical  excel 
lence  in  recitation  is  attained  by  a  few  who 
are  studying  for  class  rank.  But  the  appeal 
to  a  college  student  to  work  for  the  sake  of 
learning  is  an  appeal  of  a  noble  sort,  and  if 
heartily  responded  to,  yields  a  result  of  a 
higher  order  than  an  appeal  to  ambition 
for  class  rank. 

I  was  early  impressed  with  the  great  ad 
vantages  both  to  teachers  and  students  of 
having  the  three  departments:  the  Col 
legiate,  known  here  as  the  Literary,  and  the 
Medical  and  the  Law  Departments  all  upon 
the  same  ground.  It  gave  a  certain  breadth 
and  catholicity  to  the  views  of  all.  The 
professors,  organized  as  a  Senate,  met  so 
cially  at  stated  intervals  to  listen  to  papers 
and  discuss  them,  and  so  to  consider  sub 
jects  from  their  different  angles.  As  there 
were  no  dormitories,  the  students  of  the 
different  departments  were  thrown  together 
in  their  temporary  homes  and  were  led  to 
see  that  there  were  things  worth  knowing 
outside  of  their  own  special  lines  of  work. 

I  was  also  soon  struck  with  the  good  re 
sults  of  the  plan  adopted  the  year  before 
[236] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

my  arrival  of  bringing  the  High  Schools 
into  closer  relations  with  the  University, 
by  receiving  on  diploma  the  graduates  of 
schools  which  had  been  approved  by  the 
Literary  Faculty  after  inspection  of  them. 
This  innovation  on  the  practice  of  Ameri 
can  colleges  was  due  to  the  fertile  mind  of 
Dr.  Frieze,  who  took  the  idea  from  the 
usage  of  the  German  Universities  in  receiv 
ing  the  graduates  of  the  Gymnasia  without 
examination  of  the  students.  In  adapting 
the  plan  to  our  needs,  the  Faculty  wisely 
made  provision  for  a  visit  to  the  schools  by 
some  University  Professors.  I  made  many 
of  these  visits.  The  advantages  both  to 
the  schools  and  the  University  were  soon 
obvious.  The  methods  of  the  school  visited 
and  the  fitness  of  the  teachers  for  their  work 
were  made  known  to  the  visitors.  The  op 
portunity  for  suggesting  improvements  was 
furnished.  Interviews  with  scholars  were 
held.  Frequently  the  visit  was  made  the 
occasion  for  a  public  address  on  education 
to  the  citizens.  Conferences  were  had  with 
the  school  board.  An  opinion  could  be 
formed  concerning  the  willingness  or  un 
willingness  of  the  town  to  give  the  needed 
support  to  the  school,  for  the  maintenance 
of  the  proper  standard  of  school  work.  An 
impulse  was  given  to  the  public  to  take  a 
[237] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

new  interest  in  the  school  which  the  Uni 
versity  thought  worthy  of  a  visit.  Above 
all,  an  intimate  and  friendly  relation  be 
tween  the  school  and  the  town  on  the  one 
hand  and  the  University  on  the  other  was 
established.  The  University  was  also  en 
abled  to  see  what  was  possible  to  the  High 
School  and  was  guarded  against  the  danger 
of  asking  too  much  of  the  students  as  the 
condition  of  admission. 

It  was  thought  by  some  that  the  officers 
of  the  school  would  not  be  courageous  or 
careful  in  maintaining  high  requirements 
for  the  graduation  of  students  who  were  to 
go  to  the  University.  It  proved  that  with 
few  exceptions  they  were  both  courageous 
and  careful  and  that  sometimes  they  de 
clined  to  recommend  students  to  us  who 
might  have  entered  on  examination  by  us. 
They  had  a  better  opportunity  to  know  the 
qualifications  of  students  by  observing  their 
whole  school  course  than  we  had  in  a  single 
examination,  in  which  the  pupil  by  diffi 
dence  or  accident,  might  not  do  himself  jus 
tice.  After  a  few  years  of  experimentation, 
we  found  that  judging  by  the  first  year  of 
college  work  the  students  received  on  cer 
tificate  made  a  better  showing  than  those 
received  on  examination.  Perhaps  in 
nothing  has  the  University  been  more  use- 
[238]  ' 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

ful  to  the  educational  system  of  the  State 
than  in  the  cultivation  of  the  friendly  rela 
tion  with  the  schools  by  the  introduction 
of  the  diploma  system  of  admission  of  stu 
dents.  Our  example  in  establishing  it  has 
been  generally  followed  in  the  West,  and  to 
some  extent  in  the  East,  though  not  always 
with  our  precautions  in  making  visits. 

The  year  before  I  came,  the  doors  of  every 
department  of  the  University  had,  under 
the  pressure  of  public  opinion  in  the  State, 
been  thrown  open  to  women.  Most  of  the 
professors  and  of  the  students  would  have 
preferred  that  they  should  not  be  admitted. 
On  my  arrival  the  subject  of  their  admis 
sion  was  still  under  discussion.  The  objec 
tions  raised  were,  first,  that  women  could 
not  master  the  difficult  studies  of  college, 
and,  secondly,  that  the  health  of  women 
would  suffer  under  the  strenuousness  of 
college  life.  Experience  soon  showed  that 
neither  objection  was  well  founded.  As  it 
required  some  courage  for  women  to  come 
at  first,  fortunately  those  who  did  present 
themselves  were  generally  earnest,  self- 
reliant,  scholarly  persons.  By  their  dis 
cretion  and  their  scholarship,  they  won  the 
respect  of  teachers  and  fellow  students  and 
made  the  path  easy  for  those  who  came 
after  them.  A  good  number  of  them,  after 
[239] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

graduation,  obtained  commanding  positions 
in  the  Faculties  of  Women's  Colleges,  which 
were  springing  up  in  the  East,  and  won 
honour  for  themselves  and  the  University. 

By  way  of  illustration  I  may  speak  of  our 
relation  to  Wellesley  College.  When  Mr. 
Durant,  the  founder  of  that  Institution,  was 
making  up  his  first  Faculty,  he  encountered 
difficulty  in  finding  women  with  suitable 
training  for  filling  professorships,  because 
there  were  so  few  colleges  where  women 
could  receive  the  proper  training.  Natu 
rally,  he  wrote  to  me  to  inquire  whether  we 
had  been  graduating  such  women  as  he 
needed.  I  recommended  a  graduate  of  the 
Class  of  1874  for  his  Chair  of  History.  She 
proved  so  satisfactory  that  he  then  wrote 
asking  me  to  recommend  thereafter  any 
woman  whom  I  should  deem  competent. 
That  greatly  delighted  me,  and  I  sent  him 
one  after  another  whom  he  promptly  ap 
pointed.  Among  them  finally  was  Alice 
Freeman  who  subsequently  was  appointed 
President  and  made  so  distinguished  a 
career. 

The  collegiate  education  of  women  has 
proved  of  great  value  to  the  schools.  For 
merly  they  could  not  easily  find  opportu 
nities  for  training  which  fitted  them  for  the 
best  work  in  the  high  schools.  If  by  any 
[240] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

means  they  had  obtained  it,  they  did  not 
feel  sure  of  it.  They  lacked  the  confidence 
which  is  essential  to  the  success  of  a  teacher. 
But  when  they  had  graduated  in  the  same 
classes  with  the  most  scholarly  men  who 
were  teaching,  both  they  and  the  school 
boards  had  confidence  in  their  training. 
The  schools,  in  which  a  majority  of  the 
teachers  have  always  been  women,  took  on 
new  vigour  and  life. 

The  fear  that  the  joint  education  of  the 
sexes  would  lead  to  serious  embarrassments 
proved  so  unfounded  that  it  is  found  almost 
without  exception  in  the  Colleges  and  Uni 
versities  of  the  West.  It  cannot  be  doubted 
that  the  example  of  this  University  con 
duced  largely  to  this  result,  and,  judging 
by  our  correspondence,  was  helpful  in 
opening  the  doors  of  some  European  Uni 
versities  to  women. 

Our  friends  in  the  East  have  always 
expressed  surprise  that  most  of  the  col 
leges  and  the  universities  in  the  West  have 
for  the  last  thirty  years  educated  the  sexes 
together.  They  fail  to  see  that  co-educa 
tion  in  those  institutions  was  the  natural 
development  of  the  plan  followed  in  the 
high  schools  of  the  West.  Whereas  in  the 
high  schools  of  the  East  the  sexes  were 
educated  separately,  in  the  West  they  were, 
[241] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

as  a  rule,  educated  together.  Having  thus 
been  instructed  together  up  to  the  very 
door  of  the  college,  it  was  no  violent  or  un 
natural  transition  for  them  to  enter  the 
college  together.  As  in  fact  no  serious 
objections  to  their  joint  education  have 
presented  themselves,  the  usage  bids  fair  to 
be  continued  at  least  in  the  West. 

As  I  have  always  been  fond  of  teaching 
and  have  thought  it  was  well  for  the  Presi 
dent  of  a  College  or  University  to  teach,  I 
soon  availed  myself  of  the  opportunity 
which  presented  itself  to  give  some  instruc 
tion  in  International  Law  and  in  Political 
Economy.  I  continued  to  do  so  until  I 
went  to  China  in  1880.  On  my  return  I 
resumed  the  work  in  International  Law  and 
continued  it  till  I  resigned  the  Presidency. 

In  order  to  keep  in  close  touch  with  stu 
dents,  especially  those  of  the  Literary  (Col 
legiate)  Department,  for  several  years  I 
discharged  the  duties  now  assigned  to  a 
Dean.  I  registered  all  new  comers;  I 
granted  (or  refused)  excuses  for  absence. 
I  took  the  initiative  in  examining  all  cases 
for  discipline.  The  result  was  that  I  knew 
every  student  and  could  call  him  by  name 
up  to  the  time  of  my  departure  for  China  in 
1880.  Of  course  it  was  easy  for  me  to  do 
this  in  Vermont.  But  it  was  more  diffi- 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

cult  when  I  had  to  do  with  eight  hundred 
students.  The  influence  and  the  pleasure 
it  gave  me  was  a  great  reward  for  the  effort 
required.  I  wonder  that  the  President  even 
of  a  great  University  willingly  foregoes  the 
satisfaction  which  comes  from  such  an 
intimate  relation  with  even  a  portion  of  his 
students  as  comes  from  giving  instruction 
in  some  subject. 

In  1873,  largely  through  the  influence  of 
Mr.  Claudius  B.  Grant,  at  that  time  a 
Regent  of  the  University  and  a  Member  of 
the  Legislature ,  we  persuaded  the  Legisla 
ture  to  give  us  the  proceeds  of  a  twentieth- 
mill  tax.  This  established  a  most  useful 
precedent.  In  later  years  our  twentieth- 
mill  tax  was  raised  first  to  one-eighth, 
then  to  one-quarter,  and  then  to  three- 
eighths  of  a  mill.  This  proved  to  be  a  far 
better  plan  than  the  voting  of  special 
appropriations  for  a  number  of  objects. 
It  spared  the  legislative  committees  and 
the  whole  Legislature  the  trouble  of  scruti 
nizing  a  large  number  of  specific  requests. 
It  also  enabled  the  University  authorities 
to  use  the  funds  granted  them  more  effec 
tively  and  more  economically.  For  fre 
quently  it  happened  that  before  the  term 
of  two  years  for  which  the  appropriations 
were  made  had  elapsed,  it  became  apparent 
[  243  ] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

that  the  money  granted  for  some  particular 
object  could  be  more  wisely  devoted  to 
some  other  purpose.  Furthermore  it  is 
quite  essential  to  wise  administration  that 
the  authorities  of  a  University  should  be 
able  to  lay  plans  for  some  years  ahead;  and 
resting  on  a  tax  bill  which  experience  shows 
is  not  likely  to  be  repealed,  they  can  adopt 
wise  policies  for  the  future,  when  they  might 
not  be  able  to  do  so  if  they  had  to  depend 
on  specific  appropriations  to  be  renewed  at 
every  session  of  the  Legislature. 

I  had  occasion  to  visit  the  Legislature  at 
several  sessions  to  make  known  to  our  Com 
mittees,  and  sometimes  to  the  whole  body, 
our  needs,  and  several  times  the  whole 
Legislature  visited  the  University.  I  wish 
to  bear  witness  to  the  courtesy  with  which 
I  was  always  received  at  Lansing,  and  the 
hearty  interest  in  the  Institution  which  the 
members  of  the  Legislature  always  evinced 
on  their  visits  to  us. 

Eastern  critics  of  the  system  of  State 
support  of  universities  have  often  assumed 
that  the  institutions  would  become  em 
barrassed  by  being  entangled  in  the  con 
troversies  of  party  politics.  It  can  be 
affirmed  that  such  has  never  been  the  case 
in  the  support  or  control  of  this  University. 
Different  parties  have  been  in  control  in 
[2441 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

this  State  during  the  life  of  the  Institution. 
But  we  have  fared  equally  well,  whichever 
party  was  in  power,  and  no  political  con 
troversy  in  the  Legislature  or  in  the  State 
at  large  has  ever  embarrassed  us. 

The  example  of  our  Legislature  in  passing 
a  tax  bill,  providing  in  a  lump  for  the  needs 
of  the  University,  has  been  followed  by 
several  states  to  the  great  benefit  of  their 
Universities. 

In  1875,  the  Legislature  made  appro 
priations  for  the  establishment  of  the 
Homeopathic  Medical  School,  the  College 
of  Dental  Surgery,  the  School  of  Mines  and 
a  Professorship  of  Architecture.  These  new 
departments  of  work  were  at  once  organ 
ized.  Unhappily  in  1877  the  Legislature 
did  not  continue  the  appropriations  for  the 
School  of  Mines  and  the  teaching  of  Archi 
tecture  and  we  were  obliged  to  drop  the 
work.  This  illustrates  the  difficulty  of  ad 
ministering  a  University  which  depends  on 
biennial  appropriations. 

In  1879,  under  the  pressure  of  urgent  re 
quests  which  I  had  made  for  some  years, 
the  Regents  established  the  Chair  of  the 
Art  and  Science  of  Teaching,  to  aid  in  pre 
paring  our  graduates  to  teach  in  our  schools 
or  to  superintend  schools.  Our  action  was 
severely  criticized  for  a  time  by  some  college 
[245] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

men  who  maintained  that  teaching  could 
not  be  taught  through  formal  instruction. 
But  only  a  few  years  elapsed  before  nearly 
every  university  of  standing,  including  those 
which  had  criticized  us  most  severely,  ap 
pointed  Professors  of  Education  or  Peda 
gogy.  As  a  consequence,  so-called  Schools 
of  Education  with  large  equipment  have 
grown  up  in  some  of  these  institutions. 

In  the  late  seventies  a  large  freedom  in 
the  election  of  studies  in  the  Literary  De 
partment  was  granted;  the  course  of  study 
in  the  Medical  Department  was  extended 
from  two  years  of  six  months  to  two  years 
of  nine  months,  and  the  School  of  Pharmacy 
was  organized.  During  the  decade  from 
1870  to  1880,  the  progress  of  the  University 
in  all  departments  had  been  most  satis 
factory. 

This  was  especially  gratifying  because 
from  1875  to  1879  an  unpleasant  contro 
versy  was  raging  which  threatened  havoc 
to  the  Institution.  The  accounts  of  the 
Chemical  Laboratory  showed  a  deficit  for 
which  the  Director  of  the  Laboratory  or  an 
Assistant  Professor  was  apparently  respon 
sible.  If  the  decision  of  the  question  of  re 
sponsibility  had  been  left  to  the  Regents 
alone,  it  would  probably  have  been  soon 
settled.  But  for  reasons  which  need  not 
[246] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

be  discussed  here,  persons  outside  of  the 
University  became  interested  and  a  bitter 
contest  ensued,  involving  the  Legislature, 
the  Courts  and  the  Public.  It  is  obvious 
now  that  the  difficulty  was  largely  due  at 
the  outset  to  the  defects  in  the  system  of 
bookkeeping  in  the  Laboratory.  It  was  ade 
quate  in  the  days  when  the  number  of  stu 
dents  was  small,  but  was  not  well  suited  to 
meet  our  wants  when  the  classes  had  become 
very  large.  After  the  controversy  was 
ended,  it  gave  way  to  a  better  system.  It 
is  a  good  proof  of  the  strong  hold  the  Uni 
versity  has  on  the  respect  and  affections  of 
the  people  that  the  fierce  and  prolonged 
contest  left  it  unharmed. 

During  the  last  thirty  years  there  has 
been  a  constant  and  steady  movement  for 
ward  in  the  enlargement  and  enrichment  of 
the  work  in  all  the  departments.  The  En 
gineering  which  was  carried  on  as  a  part  of 
the  Literary  Department  has  been  devel 
oped  into  a  separate  Department,  compris 
ing  Civil,  Mechanical,  Electrical,  Chemical, 
and  Marine  Engineering,  in  close  relation 
with  Architecture  and  having  nearly  three 
hundred  more  students  than  were  found  in 
the  entire  University  when  I  came  here. 
The  introduction  of  the  elective  system  into 
the  Literary  Department  added  greatly  to 
[247] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

the  variety  of  its  work.  Meantime  a  large 
graduate  school  and  a  summer  school  of 
more  than  a  thousand  students  have  grown 
up.  The  course  required  for  graduating  has 
been  extended  in  the  Law  School  and  the 
Dental  School  to  three  years  and  in  the 
Medical  School  to  four  years  of  nine  months 
each.  The  requirements  for  admission  to 
the  professional  schools  have  been  materi 
ally  raised.  Excellent  hospitals  for  the  use 
of  the  medical  schools  have  been  constructed 
and  upon  the  highly  advantageous  plan  of 
being  entirely  under  the  direction  of  the 
Medical  Faculties.  This  allows  students 
access  to  the  patients  with  a  freedom  quite 
impossible  in  hospitals  otherwise  conducted. 
The  idea  of  establishing  hospitals  on  this 
basis  originated  here,  and  is  now  being 
adopted  wherever  practicable  by  medical 
schools. 

It  is  not  intended  to  give  here  a  history 
of  the  University.  But  a  few  statistics 
may  properly  be  given.  There  were  three 
Departments  in  1871 ;  there  are  now  seven. 
The  members  of  the  Faculties  then  num 
bered  35;  now  they  are  about  400.  The 
students  then  numbered  1110;  the  last 
Calendar  (1910-11)  registered  5383.  The 
libraries  then  contained  25,000  volumes; 
now  they  have  260,000.  The  income  was 
[248] 


JAMES    B.    ANGELL 

then  $104,000;  now  it  is  $1,170,000.  The 
number  of  graduates  from  1871  to  1909  is 
about  20,000,  and  the  number  of  non-grad 
uates  approximately  17,000.  They  are 
found  in  every  state  and  territory  of  the 
Union  and  on  every  continent  of  the  globe. 

My  wife  and  I  have  received  great 
pleasure  in  our  home  from  the  visits  of 
distinguished  men  and  women  who  have 
come  to  address  the  University.  It  seems 
proper  to  give  reminiscences  of  some  of 
these  visits. 

Matthew  Arnold,  in  his  last  visit  to 
America,  accompanied  by  his  wife  and 
daughter,  was  our  guest.  It  may  be  re 
membered  that,  when  lecturing  in  the 
Eastern  cities,  he  was  criticized  and  even 
ridiculed  for  his  manner  of  delivery.  Being 
near-sighted,  he  had  a  reading-stand  as 
tall  as  he  was,  and  to  his  annoyance  his 
manner  in  darting  his  head  close  to  it  at 
each  sentence  was  compared  to  a  bird 
pecking  at  his  food.  This  fact  led  him, 
it  was  said,  to  take  some  lessons  in  elocu 
tion  from  a  competent  teacher.  His  appear 
ance  on  our  stage  was  one  of  the  first  after 
this  instruction.  He  was  received  by  our 
audience  with  great  favour,  and  his  success 
was  so  marked  that  he  spoke  to  me  with 
much  satisfaction  of  his  reception. 
[249] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

A  business  manager  accompanied  him 
on  this  Western  tour.  It  was  the  custom 
of  the  railways  in  those  days  to  give  special 
rates  to  theatrical  companies.  Mr.  Arnold 
told  me  with  great  glee  that  when  the 
conductor  of  the  train  took  the  tickets 
from  the  manager,  he  exclaimed,  "Oh! 
this  is  the  Arnold  troupe,  is  it?"  He 
continued  during  his  visit  to  address  his 
wife  and  daughter  as  the  Arnold  troupe. 

Having  passed  by  Seneca  Lake  on  his 
journey,  he  was  apparently  much  inter 
ested  in  the  fact  that  the  lake  bore  the 
name  of  the  great  Roman  philosopher. 
He  was  rather  disappointed  when  I  in 
formed  him  that  the  lake  took  its  name 
from  the  Seneca  tribe  of  Indians  and  that 
the  word  Seneca  is  in  that  case  of  Indian 
origin. 

Miss  Edith  Arnold,  Mr.  Arnold's  niece, 
was  my  guest  when  she  came  to  deliver 
a  lecture  on  the  Religious  Novel.  It  was 
an  address  of  high  literary  merit.  She 
told  me  that  a  short  time  before  his  death 
Mr.  Gladstone  had  a  prolonged  interview 
with  her  sister,  Mrs.  Humphrey  Ward, 
in  which  he  discussed  at  length  with  the 
author  the  religious  doctrines  set  forth 
in  the  novel  "Robert  Elsmere."  As  Miss 
Arnold  is  a  pronounced  advocate  of  woman 
[250] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

suffrage  and  Mrs.  Ward  is  a  leader  on 
the  other  side,  I  asked  her  how  they  got 
on  together  in  their  consideration  of  that 
subject.  "Oh,"  she  said,  "our  difference 
does  not  in  the  least  disturb  our  relations. 
For  of  course  my  sister  does  not  under 
stand  the  subject  at  all." 

Dr.  J.  M.  L.  Curry,  who  was  prominent 
on  the  Southern  side  in  our  Civil  War  and 
subsequently  our  Minister  to  Spain  and 
Agent  of  the  Peabody  Education  Fund 
for  the  aid  of  schools  in  the  South,  gave  a 
very  valuable  Commencement  Address  for 
us.  He  and  I  sat  up  till  midnight  con 
versing  on  the  race  problems  in  the  South. 
He  manifested  the  most  generous  spirit 
towards  the  blacks.  At  last,  after  pacing 
the  floor,  he  exclaimed  with  great  fervour, 
striking  the  table  with  his  hand,  "We  can 
not  see  the  whole  of  the  future.  But  one 
thing  we  can  know.  It  must  be  eternally 
right  to  educate  the  negro  and  to  Chris 
tianize  the  negro."  It  is  fortunate  that 
so  many  Southerners  have  come  to  agree 
with  him. 

Among  the  many  interesting  stories  he 
told  of  his  experiences  in  travelling  through 
the  South,  especially  among  the  "poor 
whites,"  as  they  are  called,  of  the  moun 
tain  region  between  Virginia  and  Kentucky, 
[251] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

I  venture  to  repeat  this.  In  a  very 
humble  dwelling  he  noticed  that  the 
mother  called  her  daughter  who  was  wait 
ing  on  the  table  "Ralgy."  The  name 
was  so  new  to  him  that  before  he  left  he 
asked  the  mother  where  she  found  that 
name.  In  reply  the  woman  brought  an 
empty  bottle  which  had  contained  patent 
medicine.  She  pointed  to  the  label  which 
announced  that  the  medicine  would  cure 
neuralgia  and  other  ailments.  She  thought 
neuralgia  was  a  new  and  striking  word,  and 
so  she  had  named  the  child  "neuralgia," 
which  in  familiar  address  they  had  shortened 
to  "Ralgy." 

Henry  M.  Stanley,  the  African  traveller, 
and  his  wife  were  most  entertaining  guests 
on  the  occasion  of  his  visit  here  to  lecture. 

Our  Law  students  have  for  many  years 
celebrated  Washington's  birthday  by  secur 
ing  an  address  from  some  eminent  man. 
The  February  before  Mr.  Cleveland's  second 
election  to  the  Presidency,  he  was  the  orator 
of  the  day.  I  invited  a  number  of  the 
prominent  citizens  of  both  political  parties 
to  meet  him  at  my  house  at  luncheon.  An 
immense  throng  from  various  parts  of  the 
State  came  to  hear  his  address,  which  was 
very  felicitous.  In  the  evening  a  public 
reception  was  held  by  him  in  the  city,  and 
[252] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

on  the  next  evening  another  was  held  in 
Detroit.  The  result  was  that  the  Demo 
cratic  party  in  Michigan  raised  with  much 
spirit  the  cry  for  his  nomination  to  the 
Presidency.  And  they  have  always  boasted 
that  the  impulse  thus  given  led  to  his 
nomination  and  election. 

However  that  may  be,  his  visit  to  Ann 
Arbor  certainly  had  one  result  of  some  con 
sequence.  Years  after  I  asked  him  how 
it  happened  that  he  chose  for  his  perma 
nent  residence  Princeton  rather  than  New 
York.  He  replied,  "When  I  visited  Ann 
Arbor,  you  remember  that  you  drove  with 
me  through  several  of  the  streets  of  your 
city.  And  when  I  saw  so  many  modest 
and  pleasant  homes,  I  said  to  myself  it 
is  in  a  college  town  with  its  simple  life 
that  I  will  try  to  find  a  home  when  I  am 
through  with  public  life.  I  never  lost 
sight  of  that  thought.  Hence  my  decision 
to  live  in  Princeton  rather  than  in  New 
York." 

One  of  my  more  recent  visitors  was  the 
British  Ambassador  James  Bryce,  whose 
versatility  was  admirably  displayed.  In 
the  evening  he  gave  a  most  scholarly  ad 
dress  to  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa  Society  on 
Culture.  The  next  noon  he  addressed  the 
Detroit  Chamber  of  Commerce  on  Munici- 
[253] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

pal  Government,  in  which  his  great  famil 
iarity  with  municipal  experiments  and 
discussions,  both  European  and  American, 
appeared;  in  the  evening  he  addressed  the 
University  Club  in  Detroit  on  the  changes 
in  American  college  and  university  life 
since  his  first  visit  to  our  country.  In 
this  address  he  showed  a  knowledge  of 
our  academic  life  that  could  not  be  sur 
passed  by  any  of  our  college  presidents. 
All  these  addresses  were  given  without  a 
scrap  of  paper  before  him.  One  was  re 
minded  of  the  offer  ascribed  to  Mr.  Carnegie 
to  bet  a  million  dollars  that  Mr.  Bryce 
knows  more  than  any  other  man  in  the 
world. 

Many  other  eminent  visitors  might  be 
named,  among  them  Chinese  and  Japanese 
ambassadors,  foreign  missionaries,  Univer 
sity  Presidents,  Mr.  Justice  Miller  and  Mr. 
Justice  Harlan  of  the  United  States  Supreme 
Court,  Secretary  Bayard,  Mr,  Roosevelt, 
when  Governor  of  New  York,  Sir  Frederick 
Pollock,  and  Charles  A.  Dana,  editor  of 
the  New  York  Sun.  These  names  may 
suffice  to  illustrate  how  stimulating  the 
life  of  a  University  and  especially  the  life 
in  the  President's  home  are  made  by  the 
guests  who  come  to  lend  inspiration  to 
the  Institution. 

[254] 


JAMES    B.     ANGELL 

In  considering  the  relation  of  the  Uni 
versity  to  the  State,  I  have  always  had  two 
great  ends  in  view. 

First:  I  have  endeavoured  to  induce 
every  citizen  to  regard  himself  as  a  stock 
holder  in  the  Institution,  who  had  a  real 
interest  in  helping  make  it  of  the  greatest 
service  to  his  children  and  those  of  his 
neighbours. 

Secondly:  I  have  sought  to  make  all  the 
schools  and  teachers  in  the  State  understand 
that  they  and  the  University  are  parts  of 
one  united  system  and  that  therefore  the 
young  pupil  in  the  most  secluded  school 
house  in  the  State  should  be  encouraged  to 
see  that  the  path  was  open  from  his  home 
up  to  and  through  the  University. 

The  prosperity  and  usefulness  of  the 
University  are  due  to  the  fact  that  these 
objects  have  been  in  a  fair  degree  ac 
complished. 

Although  some  State  Universities  were 
founded  before  ours,  owing  to  the  fact  that 
the  University  of  Michigan  at  an  earlier 
date  than  any  of  the  others  secured  a  very 
large  attendance  in  all  three  of  its  depart 
ments,  its  influence  in  the  development  of 
all  the  rest  has  been  very  great.  No  small 
portion  of  my  correspondence  has  been 
devoted  to  explaining  to  other  univer- 
[255] 


REMINISCENCES    OF 

sities  our  methods  and  the  reasons  of  our 
comparative  success.  I  have  been  called  to 
expound  the  principles  on  which  Michigan 
has  proceeded  in  building  up  its  University 
to  most  of  the  States  which  have  estab 
lished  their  Universities. 

Far  be  it  from  me  to  claim  undue  credit 
for  the  success  of  the  Institution.  Rather 
do  I  desire  to  speak  of  it  with  gratitude 
that  I  have  been  permitted  to  be  so  long 
associated  with  it  in  its  days  of  prosperity. 
It  has  been  a  singular  good  fortune  to  be 
allowed  to  work  with  so  many  excellent 
men  in  the  Board  of  Regents  and  in  the 
Faculties  and  to  come  in  touch  with  so 
many  students  who  have  gone  forth  to 
careers  of  usefulness  in  all  parts  of  the 
world. 

The  life  of  the  President  of  a  college  or 
university  is  often  spoken  of  as  a  hard 
and  trying  life.  A  laborious  life  with  its 
anxieties  it  is.  But  I  have  found  it  a 
happy  life.  The  satisfactions  it  has  brought 
to  me  are  quite  beyond  my  deserts.  The 
recognition  of  the  value  of  my  services 
which  has  come  to  me  in  these  recent 
days  from  regents,  colleagues,  graduates, 
and  undergraduates  humbles  me  while  it 
gratifies  me. 

And  one  acknowledgment  I  desire  above 
[256] 


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